250 Dr Boue on the Population, Agriculture, Sj-c. 



The whole population of Turkey exhibit a great deal of 

 good sense, and the traveller is also surprised to find so few 

 persons of coarse manners. Every thing is done without noise 

 and speeches ; and the masters of the post-houses, too often un- 

 polite in other countries, are here quite ready to attend to their 

 duty. The Greeks on the contrary talk a great deal more, 

 and sometimes seem to be quarrelsome. 



The population is very healthy for various reasons : their 

 mode of life is simple, and all weakly children die early for 

 want of medical advice : there are scarcely any preserved in 

 life by those artificial means which tend so much to increase 

 the population in Europe, especially in large towns ; and be- 

 sides, healthy children are much more likely to be the offspring 

 of healthy than of sickly parents. For the same reason we ob- 

 serve so few insane people and persons who squint ; as both these 

 affections arise from weakness in the nervous system. The 

 chief causes of insanity, love and religious fanaticism, have little 

 influence in Turkey, owing to the mode of life. For hke rea- 

 sons, and owing to the absence of many of the factitious wants 

 of Europe, cases of suicide and duels are hardly known : in- 

 deed it appears, that the Servians who emigrate from their own 

 country into Hungary, wisely retain their dislike to those two 

 evils of modern society. Suicide, however, excites no very 

 great sensation, as life is held cheap ; as for duels, the Turks 

 think it no disgrace to avow their love of life, and refuse this 

 mode of settling between right and wrong ; although our wisest 

 legislators are still obliged in a certain degree to allow the 

 practice in the present corrupt state of society. It is the gene- 

 ral custom to marry pretty young. The goitre is a rare dis- 

 ease, and there are few blind people, or when cases of blind- 

 ness occur, they generally arise from accidental causes, ill 

 treated diseases, or the frequent ravages of the smallpox. Vac- 

 cination is employed in Servia and some of the large towns of 

 Turkey. There aie few maimed or bandy-legged people. 



The number of cutaneous diseases seems to be small, and 

 much less than in Asia Minor. With the exception of the 

 Jews, the other inhabitants are, for their state of civilization, 

 pretty cleanly ; but lice are more common than in the middle 



