ITS ADVANTAGEOUS SITUATION. 301 



other, which, being a foreign one, should not be 

 taken into the calculation, the mortality of Fer- 

 nando Po will be found much less than that of 

 other settlements upon that coast, if it be not 

 upon a par with the most healthy of our West 

 Indian colonies. 



Fernando Po has one advantage over any 

 other situation upon the coast : its elevation is 

 so great, that any climate may be obtained there, 

 and an hospital might be established above the 

 fever-level. In fact. Colonel Nicolls had cut a 

 road up the mountain, and built a small house 

 above the fever-range ; and I had the pleasure of 

 seeing at Calebar, Mr. Ballard, a gentleman who 

 was carried up in a hammock, in the last stage 

 of fever, and had recovered immediately. The 

 fact that marsh-fever does not exist above a cer- 

 tain level (I believe three thousand feet above 

 the sea) is well known ; and as all African fevers 

 are varieties produced by marsh miasma, Fernan- 

 do Po may be said to have been placed by Nature 

 in its present position as the natural hospital for 

 the low and marshy shores of the main land. The 

 native population of Fernando Po may be about 

 five thousand, divided into tribes, that were for- 

 merly constantly at war with each other; but 



