164 On Malaria: 



district, is visible at a distance of fifty Italian miles ; but in the 

 upper and more beautiful part of it all the houses, and in the 

 remainder many of them, were deserted. When the harvest is 

 over, the richer part of the population remove, and again take 

 possession of their property in autumn. As I several times 

 wandered through the village, I saw a number of children 

 from five to twelve years old creepirig about, or lying, corpse- 

 like, in the burning rays of the sun. Amongst the grown 

 up there are fewer who are attacked by malaria ; but still, at 

 church, I saw a considerable number. Those who have passed 

 their fourteenth year are less liable to the disease ; but many 

 are seized by it, and especially, as is asserted, every newly ar- 

 rived stranger. At the inn there were three children and a 

 person advanced in life, who had been ill for several years, and 

 were apparently near dissolution. I saw several similar districts 

 in Sicily, and particularly between Caltanisella and Sulera, in 

 the centre of the country; In Calabria, Cosenza is especially 

 notorious, and is deserted in summer by nearly all the respect- 

 able inhabitants ; and it was there where I saw the fear for the 

 disease carried to the greatest extent. Neapolitans and foreigners 

 ascribe the malaria to the marshy districts ; and yet Cosenza is 

 a very dry place. There are certainly two rivulets which unite 

 below the town, but these run exceedingly rapidly over the 

 pebbles. It is only at a distance of many miles, and again 

 where Crati approaches the ancient Sibaris, that the ground be- 

 comes marshy, but still not to such an extent as to produce 

 fevers. Besides, malaria does not exist in a single place in this 

 valley of seventy miles in length, except at Cosenza, its highest 

 point. To the west of Cosenza there are conical hills of granite 

 and gneiss ; to the south, there are extensive strata of sand- 

 stone, under which appear fragments of limestone beds, and 

 traces of basaltic tuflPa and mud-like masses ; to the east, there 

 are traces of old mud volcanos, and tufFaceous tower-shaped 

 masses ; and to the north begins the highest part of the valley, 

 which descends for two days'* journey, and then terminates near 

 ancient Sibaris. The valley of the Negro presents similar fea- 

 tures ; the river flows into the Silaro, and in the lower region 

 renders marshy the district of Palla, and m^kes that of Basizza 

 so noxious, while in the highest and driest part, at the source 



