THIRD JOUHNEY. 



133 



was merely slumber. This was the time to have taken 

 medicine ; hut I neglected to do so, though I had just 

 been reading, " navis referent in mare te novi fluctus, 

 quid agis ? fortiter occupa portum." I awoke at 

 midnight ; a cruel headache, thirst, and pain in the 

 small of the back, informed me what the case was^ 

 Had Chiron himself been present, he could not have 

 told me more distinctly that I was going to have a tight 

 brush of it, and that I ought to meet it with becoming 

 fortitude. I dozed, and woke, and startled, and then 

 dozed again, and suddenly awoke, thinking I was 

 falling down a precipice. 



The return of the bats to their diurnal retreat, which 

 was in the thatch above my hammock, informed me 

 that the sun was now fast approaching to the eastern 

 horizon. I arose, in languor and in pain, the pulse at 

 one hundred and twenty. I took ten grains of calomel 

 and a scruple of jalap, and drank during the day large 

 draughts of tea, weak and warm. The physic did its 

 duty j but there was no remission of fever or headache, 

 though the pain of the back was less acute. I was 

 saved the trouble of keeping the room cool, as the wind 

 beat in at every quarter. 



At five in the evening the pulse had risen to one 

 hundred and thirty, and the headache almost insup- 

 portable, especially on looking to the right or left. I 

 now opened a vein, and made a large orifice, to allow 

 the blood to rush out rapidly ; I closed it after losing 

 sixteen ounces. I then steeped my feet in warm water, 

 and got into the hammock. After bleeding, the pulse 

 fell to ninety, and the head was much relieved ; but 

 during the night, which was very restless, the pulse 

 rose again to one hundred and twenty, and at times the 



