226 
MADAGASCAR. 
on the subject, that practically there is no infalli¬ 
ble remedy for or defence against this scourge. 
No visitor to Madagascar ever escaped altogether 
from the baneful influence of the malaria. Its 
effects, however, may be weakened, if not entirely 
counteracted. 
In the first place, a correct idea of the best 
manner of treating a fever patient may be of 
use. I always found it best, when the first 
symptoms of the approach of the dreaded but 
silent foe manifested themselves, to put myself at 
once into the hands of my native servant, a fine 
specimen of the Mozambique African, strong as a 
young lion, but tender and devoted as a child. 
When the violent shivering fit which introduced 
the attack came on, he immediately placed me in 
a bath filled with hot water and perfumed with 
aromatic plants and flowers. He held me beneath 
the water, and then proceeded to pound and 
crush every bone and joint and sinew in turn in 
his enormous hands. The next process was to 
stretch the limbs as far as possible, and even the 
fingers, and then to remove me quickly back to 
bed, where I was buried beneath the accumulated 
blankets of the household, and sometimes, when 
I was on a journey, of the entire village. But no 
sensible raising of the temperature proceeded from 
all this. The teeth rattled, and the very frame¬ 
work of the native house would be shaken by the 
