160 The Aborigines of Brazil. 



unfavourable termination frequently occurs suddenly, with 

 colliquation and dysenteric evacuations. 



The belief that periodic diseases depend much on the 

 phases of the moon, is exceedingly common among the In- 

 dians, and that they are more violent at new and full moon, than 

 during the first and last quarter.* In the neighbourhood 

 of the Amazon stream the belief is prevalent that all feverish 

 complaints are more dangerous when the waters are high, 

 (from December to April) than at other seasons ; somewhat 

 analogous is the popular belief on the east coast of Brazil, 

 that all fevers have stronger exacerbations during the flood 

 than during the ebb, and that the spring tides, which oc- 

 cur when the moon is passing the meridian, are very dan- 

 gerous. At such seasons fever patients are said to die 

 frequently from sudden apoplexy. Piso has remarked this. 

 Chronic inflammation of the liver. 



The most common fever of a bad kind, from which not 

 only the Indians, but all the inhabitants of Brazil suffer, sets 

 in with the symptoms of synochus with biliary complications. 

 It is at bottom a chronic inflammation of the liver, which 

 under certain circumstances puts on a febrile character, sinks 

 back again to a chronic state, and after repeated exacerba- 

 tions generally produces in the end a fatal result, by disor- 

 ganisation, induration or chronic suppuration of the liver: 

 at times, along with general putrid fever, at times with 

 dropsy ; more rarely, with the rupture of the larger vessels, 

 or sudden mortification. 



All the injurious influences already indicated and the 

 heat of the climate predispose to this disease. It is one 

 of the most common among the Indian as well as the civi- 

 lized population, especially in low, damp, steamy neighbour- 

 hoods, as along the course of the Madeira, the Tocantin 

 and the Amazon. From simple loss of appetite with a feeling 



* No one suffers long in this country from intermittent fever, without having 

 impressed on him the belief in lunar influence.— Tr. 



