Beowulf... Bring Out Your Dead part II

I realized I haven't posted on the progress of my reading. I've reached the midway point of "Bring Out Your Dead." This is truly a fascinating book. Apparently at the onset of the yellow fever outbreak only one doctor, a Dr. Rush, realized the magnitude of the events that were transpiring. He realized that an epidemic was about to unleash itself upon Philadelphia and he was encouraging everyone to leave. Due to the politicking though there in the city other Dr.s were contradicting him at every turn and attempting to make a name for themselves. It was all very interesting. After 3 weeks of this plague so many people had died and so many people had evacuated that civil disorder erupted. It is incredible to the mind to contemplate a sickness so terrible that beings were vomiting blood and that the stench was of such a magnitude that an older gravedigger who had previously lost his sense of smell was able to smell the stench and died from it 2 days later... or so the story goes. I am loving this book. As the history is unfolding we have gone from utter confounding in that none of the doctors were able to cure the disease with any success to that of Dr. Rush and his compatriots coming up with a virulent purge that when administered would cure 7 out of 8 people. However, due to pride and self importance other doctors refused to accept Rush's cure. They felt that he was too invasive and thus encouraged patients to avoid Rush and others that practiced his method. So many people died because of it. The tale is horrific considering if anything struck any of the cities nowadays what would the civil unrest be and the consequences be if anything of that magnitude struck. Scary thought. Anyway I am now in the fourth week of the plague and decided to change up my reading, at least intersperse it with a different story so I am rereading Beowulf (for those not wanting to read the epic poem here's the summary). I am now on page 10 of that history. I need to get back into synch with reading poetry. Whew!!! Loving it though. I always had a knack for understanding poems of that fashion.... at least I think I understood them but hey that's open to interpretation.