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DXIV: TO M. DUBOURG - Benjamin Franklin, The Works of Benjamin Franklin, Vol. VI Letters and Misc. Writings 1772-1775 [1904]

Edition used:

The Works of Benjamin Franklin, including the Private as well as the Official and Scientific Correspondence, together with the Unmutilated and Correct Version of the Autobiography, compiled and edited by John Bigelow (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904). The Federal Edition in 12 volumes. Vol. VI (Letters and Misc. Writings 1772-1775).

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DXIV

TO M. DUBOURG

London, 29 June, 1773.

Dear Friend:—

I have not time now to write what I intended upon the cause of colds, or rheums; and my opinions on that head are so singular here that I am almost afraid to hazard them abroad. In the meantime, be so kind as to tell me at your leisure whether in France you have a general belief, that moist air, and cold air, and damp shirts or sheets, and wet floors, and beds that have not been lately used, and clothes that have not been lately worn, and going out of a warm room into the air, and leaving off a long-worn waistcoat, and wearing leaky shoes, and sitting near an open door or window, or in a coach with both glasses down, are all or any of them capable of giving the distemper we call a cold, and you a rheum, or catarrh? Or are these merely English ideas?

I am ever, with the greatest esteem and respect,

Dear sir, yours, etc.,

B. Franklin.