last comparison I adhered, even after we became aware that frogs were the performers.
The rapid lowering of the temperature that accompanied the change from summer to winter was trying to most persons, shown in nothing so much as in the frequent prevalence of dysentery in the month of May. In fact there never seemed to be so complete an absence of illness in Barladong as in the summer, when the ground was as hard with heat as if it had been frozen, and bad smells were impossible in air which was dry as that of an oven: when what had been pretty flower-gardens looked no better than patches of stubble, and 80° Fahrenheit was by comparison cool and comfortable, rather than oppressive.
When the thermometer was standing at from 96° to 107° in the shade, and people were obliged, notwithstanding, to work in the harvest-field, and to cook dinners, the battle of life might be said to have commenced in good earnest; a fact which the very fowls acknowledged by going about with all their feathers in a ruffle, holding them as it were off their skin, in hopes that a little fresh air might penetrate. In such weather labour was a severe trial, but still it was not unhealthy, that is, we very seldom heard of sunstroke or of any other sickness; but I cannot help thinking that life must wear out faster for such exposure, and it is certain that youthful looks are far more fleeting than in England.
Of means and appliances for making the heat more endurable there are scarcely any. I never saw but one punkah in the colony, nor was ice ever to be seen except at the Governor's, who possessed a freezing machine.
