170 



TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



disorder is much more generally diffused among the 

 whole population. The climate, the temperament 

 of the colonists, and above all, the introduction of 

 the negro race as slaves, have co-operated, in a 

 frightful manner, to make the disorder general, not 

 only on the coast, but in the remotest parts of the 

 interior provinces of the continent. If the intensity 

 of the venom has been lessened by being trans- 

 ferred to a hotter climate, the facility with which 

 it is communicated seems to have greatly increased ; 

 on the other hand, the susceptibility is here much 

 greater than in colder countries, partly on account 

 of the more rapid action of the system, and partly 

 of the debility produced by excesses, and increased 

 by the body's being frequently overheated. The 

 small-pox, too, which for these ten years past has 

 appeared hardly otherwise than sporadically, does 

 not very injuriously affect the constitutions of the 

 inhabitants of Rio de Janeiro, because the hot 

 climate and the relaxation of the frame favour the 

 development of the disease. It cannot however be 

 overlooked, that people of the Caucasian race go 

 throus:h this disease much more easily than the 

 negroes, and still more than the Americans. It 

 almost seems as if the poison of the small-pox, 

 during the long course of its ravages, had become 

 more assimilated to the constitution of the Euro- 

 peans, than to that of the other races of mankind, 

 whose organism is not yet equally accustomed to 

 this far-spreading and powerful contagion. The 



