ABSTRACT
For 40 years from the middle of the eighteenth century, bubonic plague was still the only disease against which Britain, and indeed other European countries, established preventive quarantine. It forebode badly for the 1790s, when a new disease was to be imported from a new direction, that those 40 years were characterized by inertia and indecision, punctuated by fits of panicky, heavy-handed authority. In that sense, little had changed from the first half of the century, but the difference now was the growing complexity of the management of quarantine, against which new and stronger mercantile interests were persistent and vociferous opponents. On the control side, policy (but not responsibility) eased away from the Privy Council towards Parliament and individual politicians; on the side of those affected, opposition, though still strong in London and Bristol, moved north where it would lay down roots. Manufacturers, especially in Manchester, saw no reason why a remote and theoretical risk should deprive them of their raw materials.
