CLAIlKE*S TRAVELS. 
228 
Black sea, and the sea of Azof, have their periodical vapoittg 
of pestilence and death. Many of them are never free from 
bad air *, and numberless are the victims who, unconscious of 
the danger, have been exposed to its effects. Some attention 
should be paid to proper caution in visiting countries so cir¬ 
cumstanced ; especially as it was affirmed by our great moral¬ 
ist,* that “ the grand object of travelling is to see the shores of 
the Mediterranean. On those shores, 55 said he, ■“ were the 
four great empires of the world; the Assyrian, the Persian, 
Greek, and Roman. Ad our religion, almost all our laws, al¬ 
most all our arts, almost all that sets us above savages, has 
come to us from the shores of the Mediterranean, 55 Yet, in 
exploring countries so situated, among the ruins of ancient 
cities, and in the very midst of objects to which a literary tra¬ 
veller would most eagerly direct his attention, the danger to be 
apprehended from bad air is particularly imminent. Stagnant 
water, resulting from ruined aqueducts, from neglected wells, 
and many other causes, proves fatal by its exhalation. This I 
have found to be so true, with regard to ancient ruins in the 
south of Europe, that I rarely recollect an instance where the 
inhabitants of the neighbouring district do not caution strangers 
against the consequences of resorting thither during the sum¬ 
mer months ; consequences far more dangerous than any other 
accident to which travellers may fancy themselves exposed in 
foreign countries. By the introduction of these remarks, I am 
sensible of repeating observations already introduced ;f hut the 
importance of the caution they convey cannot be too much en¬ 
forced. Places infected by such dangerous vapour may be dis¬ 
tinguished, at the setting or rising of the sun, by thick and 
heavy mists of a milky hue; these may at that time be ob¬ 
served, hovering, and seldom rising high above the soil.J 
The mildest diseases inflicted by this kind of air, are quartan 
and tertian fevers : sometimes instant death is occasioned by 
them. The inhabitants of thegulph ol Salernum and the coast of 
Baia, as well as those resident in the Pontine Marshes,§ suffer 
4 See Boswell’s Life of Johnson, vol. ii. p. 61. Loud. 1791. 
f- See page 141. g. viii. of this volume. 
t The air of any place is seldom salutary where flies are found in great abundance. 
Another criterion of the sources of mephitic exhalation is, the appearance of the 
ttrundo pfiragmites. This plant, in warm countries, may generally be regarded bj 
travellers as “ a warning buoy." 
§ A mal aria prevails at Rome during summer; particularly in the Transtibertine 
suburbs of the city. This seems alluded to by Pliny, in a letter to Clemens, wherein 
fee describes the residence of Regulus. “ Tenet se trans Tyberim in hortis, in quibus 
Ittissimum solum porticibus immensis , riparn statuis suis occnpavit , ut est in summd 
avaritia sumptuosus , in summd inf amid gloriosus. Vexat ergo civitatem in saluberrimo 
temporeet quod vexat solatium putaU” rim* Epist. lib. iv. Ep.S. Bipoat 1789. 
