258 Mr Black on the Climate 



In the north anchorage, however, of this island, I should 

 think the effluvia from the lake near the town would prove in- 

 salubrious, it being extensive, and also near to the port. This 

 anchorage is seldom visited by any of our fleet. 



Pouqueville relates, that, on the approach of those appear- 

 ances in the air, and the fiery colour of the sun, which precede 

 the earthquakes to which this island is subject, the female inha- 

 bitants are seized with a species of hysteric convulsions, called 

 miterico ; but I have no personal knowledge of such affec- 

 tions *. 



Cephalonia. — Judging from the situation of the extensive 

 harbour of this island, I am inclined to think it a rather healthy 

 anchorage. The great height and extent of sun burnt surface 

 on the one side, over which the wind comes as if from an oven, 

 when it blows in that direction, the low and small extent of land 

 across which the Sirocco has only to pass before it reaches the 

 port, and the great scope of sea over which the southerly winds 

 previously travel, constitute, however, some demerits worthy of 

 consideration, and counterbalance the other presumable advan- 

 tages. The stagnant head of the harbour, beyond the long 

 bridge, must, besides, prove a source of miasmatic effluvia to 

 the crews of those vessels of a smaller class that refit there and 

 careen. I have seen the fitst onset of the Sirocco down the har- 

 bour raise the thermometer ten degrees. The south-east wind 

 in passing over the island of Zante, is much increased in tem- 

 perature and dryness during the summer season ; and in the 

 winter it is thereby rendered colder, if not more moist. These 

 relaxing SE. winds very often produce severe catarrhs, espe- 

 cially if cold winds have previously prevailed. 



Corfu. — This is an anchorage where a good deal of fever oc- 

 curs in the hot months; and I have witnessed its prevalence for 

 several years. In this season the winds are light, or calms pre- 

 vail ; and at night, the dews are generally very heavy. When 

 the winds blow, it may easily be observed, from the nature of 

 the surrounding localities, that they wil imbibe febrific exhala- 

 tions. To the NW., and in the line of the greatest extent of 



* Pouqueville, Voyages en Grece, torn. iii. chap. 101. 



