120 SALUBRITY OF NEW ORLEANS. [CHAP. XXVII. 



in this city, the less surprise I expressed at the 

 robust aspect of these young Creoles the better. 

 The late Mr. Sydney Smith advised an English 

 friend who was going to reside some years in Edin 

 burgh to praise the climate : &quot; When you arrive 

 there it may rain, snow, or blow for many days, and 

 they will assure you they never knew such a season 

 before. If you would be popular, declare you think 

 it the most delightful climate in the world.&quot; When 

 I first heard New Orleans commended for its salu 

 brity, I could scarcely believe that my companions 

 were in earnest, till a physician put into my hands 

 a statistical table, recently published in a medical 

 magazine, proving that in the year 1845 the mor 

 tality in the metropolis of Louisiana was 1 850, 

 whereas that of Boston was 2-250, or, in other 

 words, while the capital of Massachusetts lost 1 

 out of 44 inhabitants, New Orleans lost only 1 in 54 ; 

 &quot;yet the year 1845,&quot; said he, &quot; was one of great heat, 

 and when a wider area than usual was flooded by 

 the river, and exposed to evaporation under a hot 

 sun.&quot; 



It appears that when New Orleans is empty in the 

 summer in other words, when all the strangers, 

 about 40,000 in number, go into the country, and 

 many of them to the North, fearing the yellow fever, 

 the city still contains between 80,000 and 100,000 

 inhabitants, w r ho never suffer from the dreaded dis 

 ease, whether they be of European or African origin. 

 If, therefore, it be fair to measure the salubrity of 

 a district by its adaptation to the constitutions of 

 natives rather than foreigners, the claim set up for 



