342 Notes on Sport and Travel m 



for a time diminished the population, as lately in 

 Fiji, but unless the race was already ' on the go ' 

 from some other reasons, real depopulation never 

 takes place from that cause. I am not aware of 

 any disease having ever been introduced by a white 

 man into a new country, half so destructive as those 

 which ravaged Europe down to the time when 

 medical science passed (one hopes, permanently) 

 out of the hands of the woman and the priest. In 

 one particular case, often moaned over, there are 

 numerous reasons for believing that we imported 

 and not exported the malady, to the great increase 

 of its virulence, and that in fact the gentle Indian is 

 to blame, and not us, in the first instance ; and those 

 who wish to pursue the subject are referred to James 

 the First his Coimterblaste to Tobacco, where they 

 will find not only references of interest, but many 

 delectable hints as to other things. It is something 

 more than drink or disease which makes the brown 

 race retreat before us, as the elk and the antelope of 

 the Tula plains of California do before the innocent 

 and harmless ox. Pardicu I for that matter, if they 

 two are the great destroyers of race, how is it that 

 we ourselves manage to colonise the temperate globe ? 

 Thanks to decency and the doctor, however, we are 

 certainly better in both regards than we used to be. 

 And curious to see what a prodigious outcry there 

 is made nowadays by priest and philanthropist in 

 favour of temperance, just at the moment that the 

 simple layman has discovered out of his own wit 



