BOOK III. CHAP. VII. 663 



with, v!z. the lower rocky hills, and mountains, which are not raifed 

 Sufficiently to be inveloped with fuch hovering mifts. 



Nature, as if were, points out thefe fpots for refidence, by their mul- 

 titude ; and further recommends them, by the variety of aromatic 

 plants with which they abound. 



The richefi: vales are Teen furrounded with rocky eminencies, for 

 the mod part unadapted to profitable culture, though peculiarly fa- 

 vourable to health. 



Thofe parts of favannah land alfo, which have a fandy or gravelly 

 foil, and are fo much elevated as to have no ftagnant water lodging near 

 them, nor fubjedl to be overflown, and are at fuch diftance from hilla 

 as to receive free currents of wind, are remarkably healthful. 



I have confequently obferved, that they who have been fo prudent, 

 or fortunate, to fix their conrtant habitation on fuch fpots, were always 

 the moft healthy and robuft ; enjoyed lively fpirits, keen appetites, and 

 lived to a good old age, exempted from thofe many infirmities to which 

 the inhabitants of clofe towns, or of low, rich, damp, and badly ven- 

 tilated places, are perpetually liable. 



Before I quit the fubjeil, it may fuggefl: fome curious experiments to 

 obferve, that, as all bodies are fubjeift to expand with heat, and be 

 condenfed with cold, it follows, that the Jpecific gravities of bodies 

 cannot be the fame here as in Northern climates ; and, of courfe, that 

 a meafure of any fluid here does not contain fo much of that fluid, as 

 the fame meafure would contain in England. 



This circumftance would caufe a remarkable effe£l on the .Tripping 

 which load at this ifland, or other parts of the Weft Indies ; and they 

 would fink much lower here in the water, than in the Northern lati- 

 tudes, if Providence had not furniflied the ocean with a larger portion 

 of fait; and, hence it has been found, to increafe its fpecific gravity the 

 nearer we approach to the Line, this augmentation of weight commenc- 

 ing about the 30th degree of North latitude jP^. 



The natural effedls produced on other bodies are, that the water oi 

 rivers and fprings is lighter herp, and, ccetens paribus^ more wholefom>e 

 than in England -, and that fpirits, and all other bodies^ are propor- 



[<^] Lowthorp's Abridgem. Vol. 11. p. 297* 



7 tioaably 



