RECIPROCi^L INFLUENCE OF ANIMALS. 
633 
the evil effects of an excessively hot air, vitiated hy the 
mixture of putrid emanations.” 
This very mortal disease was not known in America before 
the discovery of that continent hy Europeans, or even before 
the introduction of negroes. Numerous authors have endea¬ 
voured to show that it has only been developed in conse¬ 
quence of the commingling of races. 
Eichorn* informs us that, at Soto la Marina, in Mexico, a 
day’s journey from the coast, no diseases of this kind were 
present until the arrival of white men; hut no sooner had 
these taken up their abode at that place than the yellow 
fever appeared. Mr. Birmin reports that the western 
shores of America are not visited by this disease. ^^But,” 
he adds, “ if commerce ever gathers a number of strangers on 
these shores, I am sure that the disease will he as frequent 
as on the eastern shores.” f 
Darwin,J alluding to the destruction of the aborigines in 
New South AVales, hy vice and disease, goes on to say. 
Besides these evident causes of destruction, there appears 
to be some mysterious agency generally at work. Wherever 
the European has trod, death seems to pursue the aboriginal. 
AVe may look to the wide extent of the Americas, Polynesia, 
the Cape of Good Hope, and Australia, and we shall find the 
same result. Nor is it tlie white man alone that thus acts 
the destroyer; the Polynesian of Malay extraction had, in 
parts of the East Indian Archipelago, thus driven before him 
the dark-coloured native. The varieties of man seem to act 
on each other in the same way as different species of animals, 
the stronger always extirpating the weaker. It was melan¬ 
choly in New Zealand to hear the fine energetic natives 
saying, ‘ they knew the land was doomed to pass from their 
children.’ ” 
Captain Beechey § states that the inhabitants of Pitcairn 
Island are firmly convinced that after the arrival of every 
ship they suffer from cutaneous and other disorders. He, 
however, imagined that this might be attributed to the 
change of diet many of them experienced during the time of 
the visit. 
Vancouver makes a similar statement with regard to' 
Otaheite; indeed, it is a general belief among the natives, 
that the whites import all diseases into the south—the Gam- 
bier islands, Rapa, Raivavai, Tuhuai, Rurutu, and Raratonga. 
In the latter island a destructive pestilence broke out imme- 
* ‘ Das Galbe kieber, p, 155. f ‘ Basil Hall’s Voyages,’ p. 229. 
f ‘Voyages of Adventure’ and Beagle,’ vol. iii, p. 520. 
§ ‘Voyages,’ vol. i, chap. iv. 
