Ad 
4g 
THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 48% 
journey down the defert, to which Heaven, in pity to man- 
kind, has confined it, and where it has, no doubt, contribu- 
ted to the total extinction of every thing:that hath the breath 
of:life. A thermometer graduated upon this fcale would 
exhibit a figure very different from the common one; fort 
am convinced by experiment, that a web of the fineft muf- 
lin, wrapt round the body at Sennaar, will occafion at mid- 
day a greater fenfation of heat in the body than the rife of 
r% in the thermometer of Fahrenheit. 
‘Ar Sennaar, from 7o° to 78° in Fahrenheit’s thermometer 
is cool; from 79° to'g2° temperate ; at 92° begins warm. 
Although the degree of the thermometer marks a greater 
heat than is felt by the body of us ftrangers, it feems to me 
that the fenfations.of the natives bear ftill a lefs proportion 
to that degree ‘than ours. -On the 2d of Auguft, while I 
was lying perfectly.enervated on a carpet, ina room delu- 
ged with «water, at twelve o’clock, the thermometer at 116°, 
I faw feveral black labourers pulling down a houfe, work- 
ing with great vigour, pathos any fymptoms of being at 
all incommoded.,, 
"Tue difeafes of Sennaar are the dyfentery, or bloody flux, 
‘fatal in proportion as it begins with the firit of the rains, or 
the end of them, and return of the fair weather. Intermit- 
ting fevers accompany this complaint very frequently, 
which often ends in them. Bark is a fovereign remedy in 
this country, and feems to be by fo much the furer, that it 
purges on taking the firft.doze, and this irdoes almoft with- 
out exception. Epilepfies and fchirrous livers are likewife 
very frequent, owing, as is fuppofed, to their defeating or 
diminifhing perfpiration, or ftopping the pores by conftant 
3P.2 unction, 
