OF THE CARKIBBEE ISLANDS. 67 



brile disturbance, much painful numbness of the soles of 

 the feet, and more or less of spasmodic twitchings and tre- 

 mors. All the Negro servants were more severely affected 

 than the white members of the family, and the black cook 

 died from the effects of the poison ; confirming the popular 

 opinion, from the fatality thus falling, as in other inst^mces, 

 upon the blacks, of their constitutions being more amenable 

 to the action of the fish-poison than those of the whites. But 

 it ought here to be remarked, that these last suffered exactly 

 in proportion as they had partaken of the fish, and the Gene- 

 ral's lady, who had dined almost entirely upon it, felt the ef- 

 fects of the poison for many months afterwards. The numb- 

 ness of the feet, with the peculiarly painful sensation of the 

 soles, continued for a very long time. So little danger was 

 apprehended by the inhabitants from the use of this fish, 

 though all of them knew it to be occasionally poisonous, that, 

 two days after the accident, I saw a very large one cut up, and 

 distributed in the market-place amongst a number of purcha- 

 sers, all of whom treated my interference with merriment, and 

 jeered good humouredly at my warnings against it. 

 .; Though the majority of the British Medical Staff had long 

 been resident in the West Indies, the accident in the Quarter- 

 master-General's family was so new to most of them, that we 

 hesitated not to call in the aid of the French Faculty of the 

 place, who prescribed (the necessary evacuations having been 

 premised) the sulphuret of potash in the first instance, in as 

 large and frequent doses as the stomach could bear, and then 

 the saccharine mucilages, in every shape that could be offer- 

 ed ; and this treatment, more particularly that of the saccha- 

 rine regimen, appeared to be very effectual. It did not appear 

 that the alkaline remedy produced much effect. A very short 

 time after this occurrence, a shoal of the green-backed caval- 



I 2 ]oes 



