6 LETTER I. 



oblong hole at the top. In the JVeJl Indies they are 

 ufually named Nipple Shells, on account of their 

 being a fovereign Remedy for the fore Nipple of 

 a lying-in Woman's Breaft, being applied thereto. 

 You fay, that they are helpful to the Nipple 

 only by protefting it from external Injury, which 

 its figure is proper for ; but I fee no reafon why 

 they fhould not likewife have a healing Vertue, 

 as the good experienced Ladies there affert 3 for 

 they are full of Salts : No body I believe ever 

 faw a Fifli in them, fo that, ^cere^ How 

 they are formed. Now whether this healing 

 vertue or quality yet remains in them, I vaftly 

 queftion ^ becaufe of the alteration of Climate 

 and length of time fince they were gathered from 

 off the Sea-fhore, Nevis lying in the fixteenth 

 degree of Northern Latitude, and the Shells be^ 

 ing gathered in the year of our Lord 1720. 

 This I know from my own obfervaticwi, that the 

 Cortex Peruv. never fails of curing any Intermit- 

 ting Fever (or even a Remitting one, as the Dodlors 

 term the loweft abatement of that Diftemper) at 

 Nevis y which is fituate in a hot Climate ; where- 

 as it frequently miffes of that happy effed: in plain 

 Intermiflions of an Ague here in EnglanJy a very 

 cold Climate: From, whence I would conclude 

 its Vertue to be ftrongeft, in Countries of much 

 the fame Latitude with Peru ; or at leaft, that 

 Human Bodies there are more eafily worked 



upon 



