420 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



Laftly, Dr. Aftruc fays, according to his opinion (»), 

 after having examined and weighed the teftimonies of au- 

 thors, that the venereal difeafe was not peculiar folely 

 to the ifland Haiti, or Hifpaniola, but alfo common to 

 many regions of the old continent, and, perhaps, to all 

 the equinoctial countries of the world in which it prevail- 

 ed from antiquity. This ingenuous confeflion, from a 

 perfon fo well informed on this fubjec't, and befides fo 

 prejudiced againft America, as well as the teftimonies 

 above mentioned, are fufficient to demonftrate, that al- 

 though we fuppofe the French evil to have been ancient- , 

 ly exifting in the new world, nothing can be adduced on 

 this fubject: by the Europeans againft America, that can- 

 not be laid by America againft many countries of the 

 old world, and that if the blood of the Americans was 

 corrupted, as M. de Paw would argue, that of the Asi- 

 atics and Africans was not more wholefome. 



Dr. Aftruc adds, that from thofe countries of Afia 

 and Africa, in which the French evil was endemic, it 

 might be communicated by commerce to the neighbour- 

 ing people, though not to the Europeans ; becaufe, the 

 torrid zone having been deemed uninhabitable, there 

 was no commerce between thofe countries and Europe. 

 But who is ignorant of the commerce which Egypt had 

 for many centuries with the equinoctial countries of Afia, 

 and on another fide with Italy ? Why therefore, might 

 not the Afiatic merchants have brought along with their 

 drugs the French difeafe into Egypt, and from thence the 

 Venetians, Genoefe, and Pifans, carry it into Italy, as 

 they had for a long time a continual commerce with the 

 city of Alexandria, in the fame manner as other Euro- 

 peans carried into Italy from Soria and Arabia, the le- 



profy 



(n) Be Morbis Venereis, lib. i. cap. II. 



