154 PORTO CABELLO. 



the use of opium, benzoin, and alcoholic draughts 

 had been substituted for the old debilitating method, 

 the mortality had been reduced to 20 in 100 among 

 Europeans, and 10 among natives. 



The heat of Porto Cabello is not so intense as that 

 of La Guayra, the breeze being stronger and more 

 regular, and the air having more room to circulate 

 between the coast and the mountains. The cause 

 of the insalubrity o f the atmosphere is therefore to 

 be sought for in the exhalations that arise from the 

 shore to the eastward, where at the beginning of the 

 rainy season tertian fevers prevail, which easily de- 

 generate into the continued typhoid. It has been 

 observed that the mestizoes employed in the salt- 

 works have a yellower skin when they have suffered 

 several years from these fevers. The fishermen 

 assert, that the unwholesomeness of the air is owing 

 to the overflowings of the rivers and not to inunda- 

 tions of the sea, and it has been found that the 

 extended cultivation along the^ banks of the Rio Es- 

 tevan has rendered them less pestilential. 



The salt-works are similar to those of Araya, 

 near Cumana, but the earth at Porto Cabello con- 

 tains less muriate of soda. As the employment is 

 very unhealthy, the poorest persons alone engage in 

 it. The defence of the coasts of Terra Firma was 

 maintained at six points, the castle of San Antonio 

 at Cumana, the fortifications of La Guayra, Porto 

 Cabello, Fort St. Charles, and Carthagena. Next 

 to Carthagena the most important place is Porto 

 Cabello. The harbour is one of the finest in the 

 world, resembling a basin or little inland lake, open- 

 ing to the westward by a passage so narrow that 

 only one vessel can anchor at a time, and is defended 

 by batteries. The upper part of it is marshy ground 

 filled with stagnant and putrid water. At the time 

 of Humboldt's visit the number of inhabitants was 

 9000. 



Leaving Porto Cabello on the 1st March at sun- 



