English physician (fl. 1831). Two autograph letters (one signed "your son"). Cairo and Alexandria. 4to. 7 pp. on 2 bifolia.
$ 3,254 / 2.800 €
(95538/BN63108)
Interesting letters from the English doctor William Prue Jorden, a travel companion of Alexander Turnbull Christie (1801-32), the Scottish physician who visited Egypt to study epidemic diseases and acquire mummified remains that were presented to the British Museum after his premature death in 1832. - Addressing his father, Jorden describes visiting Thebes, Nubia, the island of Philae, Ebsambaul, Cairo, Kenneh and Alexandria, commenting on historic sites and monuments, not omitting the fact that Mohamed Ali Pasha had the gateway of Denderah demolished and prohibited excavations because his son and later successor, Ibrahim Pasha, was personally excavating for his own gain: "The Pasha has pulled down some of these ancient edifices to build his cotton manufactories & magazines etc.
while at the same time he has issued orders that no person should be allowed to make excavations, because his Son Ibrahim Pasha has turned Antiquarian". He comments at length on the cholera outbreaks both in England and Egypt, speculating on the causes of the disease and the route of transmission, pointing out that quarantine does not appear a suitable means of containment, and advising his father to avoid fruit and green vegetables altogether, so as to minimize the risk of infection. - Jorden further mentions John Gardner Wilkinson (1797-1875), the "father of British Egyptology", acknowledging his research and reputation, while pointing out that "he appears to have fallen too much into the Turkish habit of smoking away time as if of no value" and concluding that Wilkinson is about to return to England for his health. - The letter from January 1832 mainly covers Jorden's imminent return to England after having recovered from typhus, expecting to reach London by mid-April: "I drank copiously of cold Nile water, Lemonade, & sucked Oranges, giving no encouragement to the disease [...] when I get home I hope to get through my examinations, & make myself useful for I see you have got a new Hospital at Charing Cross erecting, & the Cholera is stepping south, I shall not do as the French & Italian Doctors in Egypt did, run away or shut themselves up & leave the poor people to die without assistance.".