Sir John Cheke and Sir Thomas Smith. 107 25th of May following he was sent ambassador into Francs with the bishop of Ely and the marquess of Northampton to negotiate the King's marriage. He returned in August, shortly after the cessation in England of the epidemic called the Sweating Sickness." 1 This was the last occurrence of the peculiar epidemic called the Sweating Sickness, or Sudor Anglicut, which had before prevailed in England in the years 1486, 1507, 1517, and 1528. It was at its height in London in the middle of July 1551, when it drove the royal household to Hampton Court, as is particularly noticed by King Edward in his Journal: and it Listed during the remainder of the month, destroying more than 900 persons in the metropolis. The young duke of Suffolk and his only brother died of it at the bishop of Lincoln's palace at Buckden, on the 14th of July. At Lough borough, in Leicestershire, it prevailed at the end of June and beginning of July, and I take this opportunity to make public the following accurate copy of the curious record of its ravages in that then small town, which I recently copied from the parish register: JUNE 1551. (f The Swatt called new acquyrtancc allf Stoupe knave and know thy Master began the xxiiij" 1 of this monethe 1551: Robert Kirkani 1 , 27. 28. Richard Harryman 2 , Eliz. Andrew 3 , John Crockton 4 , 29. John Dedicke 5 , Katteryn Jenkinson, George Nashe, 30. Johan' Moone, Ellyn Fowler, John Reedes, Anderew Willocke, Alice Fisher: all bur. w th in ffoure dayes. ( Next page) IN JULI.I 1551. 1. The Sweatte, or new acq'mtance Will'm Smithe 2. John Dale Ellyn ney dahm' all theis buried w tn m ^ yllm Button three dayes. 3. Marye Brownfuild Ellyn Aslyne & Edmud Aslyne (But that was the end of the mortality in this town, as there are no other burials during the month, except of two newly-born infants.) The familiar names of New acquaintance, and Stoop, knave, and know thy master, were not the only ones that were given to the disease. In the register of Uffculm, co. Devon, it is termed, " the hole sickness or Stup- gallant ;" and Thomas Ilancocke, whose autobiographical anecdotes are among the " Narratives of tht- Reformation," printed for the Camden Society, calls it the " Posting-sweat, that posted from town to town thorow England, and was named Stop-Gallant, for it spared none." One of the most interesting books pub- lished by the Sydenham Society, entitled " The Epidemics of the Middle Ages, from the German of J. F. C. Hecker, M.D., translated by B. G. Babington, M.D., F.R.S.," 184C, contains an essay on the sweating sickness, together with a reprint of the contemporary treatise upon the subject by Dr. John Caius, first published in 1556; but there are in Blakeway's History of Shrewsbury some curious notices which escaped Dr. Hecker and his English editor. See also the Notes to Machyn's Diary, p. 319, and the Literary Remain* of King Edward VI., p. 330. P2
