BOOK IL CHAP. VIII. 107 



viiion for enlarging and rendering it more airy. The number of 

 Whites ufiially fhut up here is about ten ; and of Negroes about 

 one hundred. This was formerly the habitation of that ingenious 

 and learned mathematician, Mr. Macfarlane, who built and fitted 

 it up as an obfervatory ; little fufpc^ling perhaps at the time, that 

 it would be converted into a receptacle for unfortunate perfons, 

 who are here precluded from almofl every other amufement than 

 that of liar-gazing. 



The flreets are all wide and regular, the houfes many of them 

 extremely elegant, and kept very clean, confidering thefe circum- 

 ilances, and that the foil on which they (land is perfeftly dry. It 

 is natural to fuppofe, that the air is healthy ; at lead there appears 

 not hitherto any local caufe affignable why it iliould be otherwife ; 

 neverthelefs, it is certain, that Kingflon has been accufed of being 

 an unwholefome fpot. Sir Hans Sloane, indeed, obferves, that in 

 his time, at fome plantations bordering upon this bay of Liguanea, 

 many white perfons died, as he believed, by the ill air ; fome of 

 thele fettlements lying in bottoms, or low fituations, contiguous 

 to marfhes near the harbour ; and, on the other hand, that plan- 

 tations, feated high, were very healthy, and their inhabitants not 

 fickly. The land Weflward from the town, and confining on the 

 harbour, is, for four or five miles, very low and flat, interfperfcd 

 with lagoons, and in many places fubjecfl to be overflown by the 

 falt-water. The hofpital of Greenwich, fituated little more than 

 a mile from the town, upon part of this low land, is remarkable 

 for a bad air, and the mortality which always prevailed there. 

 The effefts of its unhealthy fituation were, that, when a patient 

 was fent thither with only a gentle or intermitting fever, this mild 

 difpofition was apt to be changed into either a malignant fever, a 

 bloody flux, or fome other mortal diftemper. It was obferved, 

 that the yellow Wefl:-Indian fever often reigned there, attended 

 with the mod profufe evacuations of blood, by vomiting, flools, 

 and even by every pore of the body : when no fuch fymptoms di- 

 flrefled thofe patients whofe cafes had been fimilar, and who were 

 permitted to remain in their Ihips. The recovery of patients in that 

 hofpital was obferved to be very tedious and uncertain : the leaft in- 

 dilcretion or irregularity brought on a relapfe^ After a flux had 



P 2 been 



