510 
ON THE MALIS HRACUNCULUS, 
certain portion of the year, an epidemic disease. For the pur- 
pose of obtaining every possible information on this curious and 
interesting subject, I proposed to the gentlemen conducting the 
largest plantations on which the disease prevailed, a set of ques- 
tions ; and the following is the substance of the answers given. 
These answers were the more valuable, as they proceeded from men 
actually living on the spot for many years prior to the period in 
question, and uninfluenced by professional theories or prejudices, 
and urged by motives of pressing interest to state correctly the 
existing facts, in order to obtain relief from a most embarrassing 
and extensive calamity : — Mr. Templeman, of the plantations of 
Edmund Thornton, Esq., thus stated the circumstances relative 
to the guinea-worm, under his own immediate observation ; viz. 
that the guinea-worm had been epidemic on the plantation 
under his charge, during a certain period of the year, for seven 
years, or from 1787 to 1794, when I left Grenada ; — that the well 
of the water of which the field-negroes exclusively drink had 
been dug nearly about the same time, or about eight years ; and 
was dug in consequence of others more distant from the sea 
giving an inadequate supply of water ; — that the water has been 
always perfectly limpid and transparent to the naked eye, and 
has no disagreeable smell ; — that it rises during flood tide about 
four or five feet, and sinks as much during ebb ; — that its taste 
is brackish, and although the water itself appears to the eye pure 
and clear, yet there is always a considerable accumulation of filth 
at the bottom, notwithstanding its being frequently cleaned out, 
and this filth smells very disagreeably ; — that the well is situated 
about a hundred yards from the sea, near the centre of a small 
valley running obliquely from the sea into the country; — that it 
is cut out of a soft tuf; — that the sides and bottom of the little 
valley are formed of the same substance, having a thift coat of 
soil, in which cotton and other plants are cultivated or grow 
spontaneously ; — that those only who drink of the water of this 
well have been afflicted with the guinea-worm ; — the white inha- 
bitants, and domestic negroes, who always drink rain-water, have 
never, except in four instances, had the disease ; — that the field- 
negroes, who drink no other water but that of this well, are uni- 
versally subject to the worm, so that almost every one of about 
three hundred has had it to a greater or less extent, or from one to 
ten worms at a time in various parts of the body, during the 
months of November, December, January, and February, every 
year; — that the annual recurrence of the disease is most regular; 
— that it first appears generally about the 20th of November, and 
before the month of March, when it usually ceases, almost every 
field- negro on the plantation has suffered by it;— that in January 
