CHAP. XIV.] 
VAPOUR BATH FOR FEVER. 
391 
ing, and protected it from the air ; this gave it a bad 
flavour, and we returned it to the dealer as useless. 
A short time after, he returned with fresh butter in a 
perfectly new green leaf, and we were requested to 
taste it. Being about the size and shape of a cocoa- 
nut, and wrapped carefully in a leaf with only the 
point exposed, I of course tasted from that portion, 
and approving the flavour, the purchase was completed. 
We were fairly cheated, as the butter dealer had packed 
the old rejected butter in a fresh leaf, and had placed 
a small piece of sweet butter on the top as a tasting 
point. They constantly attempted this trick. 
As retailers they took extraordinary pains to divide 
everything into minimum packets, which they sold for 
a few beads, always declaring that they had only one 
packet to dispose of, but immediately producing another 
when that was sold. This method of dealing was ex¬ 
ceedingly troublesome, as it was difficult to obtain 
supplies in any quantity. My only resource was to 
send Saat to market daily to purchase all he could find, 
and he usually returned after some hours’ absence with 
a basket containing coffee, tobacco, and butter. 
We were comfortably settled at Kisoona, and the 
luxury of coffee after so long an abstinence was a 
perfect blessing. Nevertheless, in spite of good food, 
I was a martyr to fever, which attacked me daily at 
about 2 p.m. and continued until sunset. Being with¬ 
out quinine I tried vapour baths, and by the recom¬ 
mendation of one of the Turks I pounded and boiled a 
quantity of the leaves of the castor-oil plant in a large 
pot containing about four gallons : this plant was in 
great abundance. Every morning I arranged a bath 
by sitting in a blanket, thus forming a kind of tent 
with the pot of boiling water beneath my stool. Half 
an hour passed in this intense heat produced a most 
profuse perspiration, and from the commencement of 
the vapour system the attacks of fever moderated both 
in violence and frequency. In about a fortnight, the 
complaint had so much abated that my spirits rose in 
