DR. BENJAMIN ALLEN, OF BRAINTREE. 7
and detailed record of such observations, extending (as this
does) to several hundred closely-written pages approximating
foolscap size.
The references to Samuel Dale are, in this volume, as in the
other,10 singularly few. I have noticed four only. From the
tone of one or two of these, one seems to gather that there was a
certain amount of professional jealousy in the way Allen regarded
Dale.
In one place (p. 46), Allen refers to the case of a man bitten
by a mad dog, who was brought to him for treatment in 1695,
"but [he says], I being at London, he went to Mr. Dale."
Elsewhere, Allen pastes in (p. 329) a letter, dated 10th Nov.
1720, from Sir Hans Sloane, the Royal Physician, to Dale, who
had written to Sloane, on Allen's behalf, asking his opinion as
to the best method of treating some difficult case of fever—
indeed, it looks almost as though it had been on behalf of Allen
personally that Dale had consulted Sloane. In any case, the
great physician seems generally to have approved what was
being done in treating the patient—whether Allen or someone
else.
Another case in which Dale was concerned was that of Mrs.
Luckin, of Bocking, who suffered from "a periodical agueish
jaundice," of which Allen says (p. 93):—
"I try'd the bark and common elect[uary] for a jaundys mentioned
before, but toucht neither the ague nor the jaundys. I would have had
her taken the Epsom Salt and then gone to the waters [at Tunbridge
Wells]; but Mr. Dale, her acquaintance, oppos'd me and carry'd her
away from sound advice; so, in his essays, she dy'd."
Again, referring (p. 283) to some children belonging to the Tabor
family, who were suffering from the small pox and were being
treated by Dale, who had bled them, Allen seems to have
considered Dale's treatment ill-advised. However, the children
recovered, so no harm was done.
References to Ray are, on the other hand, quite numerous.
Most of them tend to show that (in the earlier period of their
acquaintance, at any rate) the relations of the two men were
intimate, and that Allen had for Ray a feeling of respect amount-
ing almost to veneration. Over and over again, Allen has noted
down some fact which Ray had told him or some opinion Ray had
10 See ante, p. 153