the French West-India Islands. 135 



some bitters, such as bark of lemon-trees, the little cen- 

 taury reduced to powder, and the cashoo. A physician, 

 deprived of narcotics in a country where the heat of ani- 

 mal spirits is violent, would be at a great loss. Lauda- 

 num may be compared to a beneficent dew, which, in 

 warm countries, ought to be viewed as a true panacea. 

 Indeed it proves so successful as to secure to him who 

 seasonably administers it, the admiration of every 

 body. >» 



Those who are costive should not be purged before 

 the fifth or sixth day of the disease. They ought com- 

 monly to continue the use of the above-mentioned ecco- 

 potrick three or four days : for I have observed that if they 

 were discontinued, the morbific matter which had been 

 dislodged by them, was re-absorbed, and re-animated 

 the fever more than it did before ; whereas, if the use 

 of light purges was persisted in, the pulse lost its close- 

 ness, expanded, and assumed its natural state. The pa- 

 tients having been sufficiently purged, they ought to get 

 rid of the remains of the fever by mild bitters. 



4. I am still to speak of the pleurisies (fluxions de 

 poitrine), which, as I have already said, are, in that sea- 

 son, almost all symptomatic ; of the cholera- morbus, and 

 of the dysentery. 



They may sometimes administer an emetic in the early 

 stageof the pleurisy; but I propose this with great doubt: 

 for the hardness of the pulse, which almost always at- 

 tends the diseases of this country, is a counter- indica- 

 tion that it would be rash to neglect. However, when it 



