26 Historical 



is very cold, it does not corrupt or cause decay in dead bodies, because 

 putrefaction proceeds from warmth and humidity (page 89). 



A celebrated Spanish historian, who wrote shortly after Acosta, 

 Antonio d'Herrera, took up the ideas of the learned Jesuit, and, 

 without quoting him, copied almost in full the passages which we 

 have just put before our readers/' But it is evident that he could 

 not include the whole of the explanation of Acosta; at least it 

 would be useless to include here his chapter: Reasons why it is so 

 dangerous' to pass through the "Puertos Nevados" which lead to 

 Chile, and the passes of the province of Quito through which Belal- 

 cazar and Alvarado crossed with their armies. 



A century and a half passed without the historians and the 

 travellers speaking of the physiological symptoms which Acosta 

 had noted. The "Lettres Edifiantes", 7 in which there are so many 

 details, generally childish but sometimes interesting, do not allude 

 to them, although their writers were evidently several times in 

 the same conditions as their predecessor. My researches in the 

 authors of the seventeenth century have revealed nothing pertinent 

 to our subject. 



But a document published at the beginning of the eighteenth 

 century shows us that in the Andes it had been known for a long 

 time that at certain points more or less severe symptoms attack 

 men and animals. We even find in this document an explanation 

 which recurs up to the present. A Frenchman, Frezier, 8 visited 

 the coasts of Chile and Peru from 1712 to 1714; he speaks at length 

 of the rich mines in the interior of the country, and after discussing 

 the origin of the metals, he adds: 



It is certain that strong exhalations issue constantly from the 

 mines; the Spaniards who live above them are obliged to drink very 

 frequently Mate, the grass of Paraguay, to moisten their lungs, and 

 thus prevent a sort of suffocation. Even the mules which pass through 

 these places, although they are much less rugged and steep than others 

 along which the mules run, are obliged to rest almost every moment 

 to regain breath. But these exhalations are much more evident within; 

 they are so powerful over bodies not accustomed to them that a man 

 who enters for a moment comes out as if crippled. . . . The Spaniards 

 call this illness Quebrantahuessos, that is, it breaks the bones (page 

 150). 



Frezier had no opportunity to make personal observations. But 

 a few years later, in 1736, three French Academicians, Bouguer, La 

 Condamine, and Godin, went to Peru to measure a degree of the 

 meridian there. It was at the time of this celebrated expedition 

 that the symptoms of decompression were first studied and dis- 



