CANAL. 97 



In my opinion, the period of the greatest un- 

 healthiness of a country, is the intermediate state 

 between a state of nature and a state of cultivation. 

 The felling of trees produces vegetable decompo- 

 sition, and opens the earth and the water to the 

 action of solar heat. Evaporation and exhala- 

 tion are augmented, and poisons which were be- 

 fore inert and inactive, are excited into deleterious 

 activity. The Python of the ancient m3^thology 

 was intended to represent the terrible miasmata of 

 this or an analogous state. Ovid thus speaks of 

 the evepts which immediately followed the deluge, 



Ergo ubi diluvio tellus liitulenta recenti 

 Solibus aethereis altoque recanduit sstu, 

 Edidit enumeras sprcies : partimque figuras 

 Retulit antiquas : partim nova monstra ereavit. 

 Ilia quidem nollet, sed te quoque, maxime Pythfon, 

 Turn genuit ; populisque novis, incognite ser^pis, 

 Terror eras : tantum spatii de nionte tenebas. 



The influence of cultivation was personified in 

 Apollo, who slew the serpent. 



Although the clearing of a country does not 

 create new beings, yet it multiplies their number, 

 and augments their power of good and evil. The 

 food which is furnished to the voracity of insects, 

 and the heat which is administered to their pro- 

 pagation and growth, are increased by settlement. 

 Man — the useful creatures by which be is surrouii- 



