124 On the Diseases of 



V. An Idea or Sketch of the most common Diseases of 

 the French West-India Islands, to which those who 

 land there, for the first time, are above all subject. By 

 the Knight of St. George. Communicated to the 

 Editor, by the late Dr. John Foulke, of Phila- 

 delphia. 



IT is to you that are called by your extensive 

 trade to the French West- India Islands, that I undertake 

 to give the history of the too often fatal diseases with 

 which the new comers are commonly attacked in that 

 country, and which are the same that I had an opportu- 

 nity of attending to, in those latitudes, on board the 

 King's men of war, even from the year 1765. I shall 

 subjoin the means that I employed to cure them, and 

 those which I found successful in preventing them, ac- 

 cording to the advices of the celebrated Gamier, King's 

 Physician in Guadaloupe. 



All those who come to the islands ought to expect to 

 fall sick, a natural effect of the passage from a temperate 

 air to that of countries excessively hot. To this gene- 

 ral cause are often added several others, which can be 

 prevented only by a strict moderation in the use of spi- 

 rituous liquors, and of fruits of all kinds, which are plen- 

 tifully met with ; and, above all, by a strict chastity, 

 until, being naturalized to the climate, they can form a 

 lawful connexion. I shall not undertake the physical 

 explanation of the effect of too hot an air upon the animal 

 economy. I do not know of any thing better on this 

 subject, than what Mr. Poissonnicr Desperricrcs wrote 



