AFRICA. 143 
our eyes to fee objeds as they really exifted. 
At others, on the contrary, our vifual faculty 
was fudJenly annihilated, we experienced a 
temporary lofs of fight, and for fome minutes 
remained as it were blind. 
All thefe contradidory eiFe£ts, which de- 
ftroyed each other, were by my people afcrlbed 
to forcery. For my part, I confidered them 
as occafioned principally by the adion of the 
fun ; for, though it was upwards of feven weeks 
Cnce it had quitted the tropic, and confe- 
quently, in advancing towards the equator, it 
darted upon us only oblique rays, it had never- 
thelefs fo heated the earth, and the atmofphere 
was fo fcorching, that the therniometer re- 
mained conftantly above loo*. 
Whatever may have been the caufe of our 
fufferings, it had an influence on my conftitu- 
tton. Since that period I have been fubjed to 
hemorrhages and head-achs, to which 1 ^as 
before a ftranger, and with which, perhaps, I 
lhall be occafionally attacked during the re- 
mainder of my life. 
1 have as yet faid nothing of the torment- 
ing thirft to which we were condemned dur- 
ing the whole journey. We, indeed, found 
every 
