days. The earth, notwithstanding the heat of these days, is yet perpetually cold, so as to feel disagreeably to the soles of the feet; partly owing to the six months rains, when no sun appears, and partly to the perpetual equality of nights and days; the thinness of the cloathing in the better sort, (a mullin shirt) while the others are naked, and sleep in this manner exposed, without covering in the cold nights, after the violent perspiration during the sultry day. These may be reckoned imprudences, while the constant use of stagnant putrid water for four months of the year, and the quantity of salt with which the soil of those countries is impregnated, may be circumstances less conducive to health; to which, however, they have been for ever subject by nature.
It will be very reasonably expected, that, after this unfavourable account of the climate, and the uncertainty of remedies for these frequent and terrible diseases, I should say something of the regimen proper to be observed there, in order to prevent what it seems so doubtful whether we can ever cure.
My first general advice to a traveller is this, to remember well what was the state of his constitution before he visited these countries, and what his complaints were, if he had any; for fear very frequently seizes us upon the first light of the many and sudden deaths we see upon our first arrival, and our spirits are so lowered by perpetual perspiration, and our nerves so relaxed, that we are apt to mistake the ordinary symptoms of a disease, familiar to us in our own country, for the approach of one of these terrible distempers that are to hurry us in a few hours into eternity. This has a bad effect in the very slightest disorders;so
