On the Aborigines of Brazil. 175 



more than their countrymen on the Amazon. Besides the 

 greater vicissitudes of climate, this circumstance may be 

 partly a cause of it, that being closely shut in by the ever- 

 spreading white population, they take less active exercise 

 than in a freer state. 



I must allude only cursorily to extra-tropical Brazil, 

 which embraces a part of the province of S. Paulo and of 

 Rio Grande do Sul, and may be looked on as a fourth divi- 

 sion as regards the character of disease. Its Indian popula- 

 tion is, comparatively speaking, small, and it generally be- 

 longs to the Southern tribe of Tupis, the Guaranis, and has 

 been more or less disturbed by the influence of the neigh- 

 bouring Spanish missions, of the former Jesuit settlements. 

 The character of its diseases approaches that of the districts 

 last described, but the inflammatory rheumatic character is 

 more prevalent.* 



General result regarding the diseases of the Brazilian 



savages. 



If we now combine into one point of view the outlines of 

 the flying picture which I have sketched, the following will 

 be found to be the essentially characteristic points : — 



1. The Brazilian Indian has scarcely any disease, that 

 belongs to him peculiarly. 



2. He shares with the other classes of the population the 

 diseases prevailing there through climatic influences. His 

 system reacts against these diseases in an analogous way 

 to that of the European, only with such difference as might 

 be expected from his natural constitution : and the charac- 

 teristic traits of his race are found in the diseases to which 

 he is most subject. 



3. In his proportionately salubrious land, the Indian knows 

 no more than the European settler of the plague, of cho- 



* We believe that no attempt has been made at a general classification of the 

 climates of the continent of India.— TV. 



2 A 



