1835,] HYDROPHOBIA. 353 
collecting fossil shells and wood. Great prostrate silicified 
trunks of trees, embedded in a conglomerate, were extraordi- 
narily numerous. I measured one, which was fifteen feet in 
circumference: how surprising it is that every atom of the woody 
matter in this great cylinder should have been removed and re- 
placed by silex so perfectly, that each vessel and pore is pre- 
served! These trees flourished at about the period of our lower 
chalk; they all belonged to the fir-tribe. It was amusing to 
hear the inhabitants discussing the nature of the fossil shells 
which I collected, almost in the same terms as were used a cen- 
tury ago in Europe,—namely, whether or not they had been thus 
“born by nature.” My geological examination of the country 
generally created a-good deal of surprise amongst the Chilenos: 
it was long before they could be couvinced that I was not hunt- 
ing for mines. This was sometimes troublesome: I found the 
most ready way of explaining my employment, was to ask them 
how it was that they themselves were not curious concerning 
earthquakes and volcanos?—why some springs were hot and 
others cold? —why there were mountains in Chile, and not a. hill 
in La Plata? These bare questions at once satisfied and silenced 
the greater number ; some, however (like a few in England who 
are a century behindhand), thought that all such inquiries were 
useless and impious; and that it was quite sufficient that God 
had thus made the mountains. 
An order had recently been issued that all stray dogs should 
be killed, and we saw many lying dead on the road. A great 
number had Jately gone mad, and several men had been bitten 
and had died in consequence. On several occasions hydrophobia 
has prevailed in this valley. It is remarkable thus to find so 
strange and dreadful a disease, appearing time after time in the 
same isolated spot. It has been remarked that certain villages 
in England are in like manner much more subject to this visita- 
tion than others. Dr. Unante states that hydrophobia was first 
known in South America in 1803: this statement is corro- 
borated by Azara and Ulloa having never heard of it in their 
time. Dr. Unante says that it broke out in Central America, - 
and slowly travelled southward. It reached Arequipa in 1807 ; 
and it is said that some men there, who had not heen bitten, were 
affected, as were some negroes, who had eaten a bullock which 
