OF THE MARSH POISON. 283 



and this has never been more strongly exemplified than in the 

 instances I am going to relate. 



Port of Spain, Trinidad, the capital of the island, is situated 

 very near the great eastern marsh, with which it is in direct 

 communication, by a marginal line of swamp along the sea- 

 shore. It cannot be called a healthy town, but it is very far 

 from being uninhabitable. On the right are some povering 

 heights, which rise out of the marsh at one extremity. These, 

 unlike the site of the town, which has been built on marshy or 

 alluvial ground, are composed of the driest and most healthy 

 materials, — (pure limestone, the purest and the best in all the 

 West Indies), yet have they proved a residence deadly and de- 

 structive in the greatest degree to all who venture to inhabit 

 any part of their diversified surface. No place, however eleva- 

 ted, or sunk, or sheltered, or walled in, gives security against 

 the exhalations from below, only it has been distinctly ascer- 

 tained, that these prevail with more or less malignity, exactly 

 in proportion to the elevation of the dwelling. The lower, 

 consequently the nearer the marsh, the better. The tops of 

 the ridges are uninhabitable. On the highest top, at an ele- 

 vation of 400 feet, and farther removed from the marsh than 

 the town itself, a large martello tower was built to defend the 

 place. It possessed a fine temperature, but proved so dan- 

 gerous a quarter, that it was obliged to be abandoned. Not 

 even a Creole mulatto Spaniard could sleep in it with impuni- 

 ty for a single night, after a course of dry weather. 



The beautiful post of Prince Rupert's, jn the Island of Do- 

 minica, is a peninsula which comprehends two hills of a re- 

 markable form, joined to the main land by a flat, and very 

 marshy square isthmus to windward, of about three quarters 



ot 



