DISEASES. 
83 
heavy cough had been brought on by constant anxiety, 
and by his walking about the country trying to per- 
suade men to lead, or proceed with us in our journey 
northwards. My fever came every second day from 
the 29th of May till the 4th of July, lasting six hours, 
making me feel weak and tottering. In July I had 
colds, discharges of mucus from the nose, and a large 
abscess burst — all of which staved off fever for a time ; 
and I had only one or two attacks, of nine hours 
each, during the two following months. In the in- 
tervals of fever I generally managed to go for a stroll 
with my gun to shoot a dove or guinea-fowl for the 
sultan or myself. Of ten Seedees who formed my 
body-guard, servants, &c, only half were generally fit 
for duty, or, perhaps, four in ten, at this S.E. wind 
season. Their complaints were of the chest, cough, 
fever, abscess, ulcers, and venereal (the social evil was 
evident every evening in the frequented part of the 
village). Our medicine - chest was at every one's 
service, but some Seedees applied to an old -lady 
doctor, who, instead of cure, brought tears and screams 
from them whilst applying her remedies to ulcers, 
bandaging them up with cow-dung and leaves to ex- 
clude the air. To cure headaches, the men cut their 
temples and rubbed in a paste of gunpowder. Blood 
would scarcely appear, but the mark was indelible, 
and the cure said to be complete. 
The diseases observed amongst the inhabitants were 
swollen legs, resembling elephantiasis, itch in children, 
scales on the eyes, a few smallpox-marked and blind 
people, one harelip, and a shrivelled infant without a 
thumb. One blind man used to visit periodically, and, 
without even the guide of a dog, knew every turn in 
