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been seen, and those were of the mildest kind. The influenza, so extensively prevalent in 1807, attacked the people of Cincinnati about the 1st of October, and disappeared in five weeks, leaving the town unusually healthy. Very few adults of either sex, but many children, escaped it. The number of deaths produced by it was inconsiderable. The consumption, however, followed in its train, and carried off several persons in the two ensuing years. Since this visitation, we have more than once experienced wide spreading catarrhs, which were ascribed to changes of the weather; but it seems probable that they arose from the same causes with the influenza. The spotted fever of the northern states has never prevailed here; but its successor, the typhoid pneumony (vulgarly called in this country the cold plague) affected a very considerable number in the winters of 1812-13 and 1813-14. In that of 1814-15, but few cases were met with. More men, in proportion, than women or children, suffered; and it generálly attacked those who were most exposed to cold and moisture. It proved fatal in a number of cases; but was, on the whole, productive of much less mortality than in the north.

Eruptive diseases of the skin are common in the Miami country, and frequently prove obstinate. The itch, and a breaking out which nearly resembles that complaint, are the most common. These eruptions, however, exhibit a great variety of appearance, and are by the people ascribed to as many different causes. They seem to be more prevalent in the country, than the town. Worms are common, and affect children of every age, from one to fifteen years. They seldom prove fatal, unless combined with some other disease. The goitre is an endemic of the western portions of Pennsylvania, and the eastern part of this state; but is unknown here, except in persons who have immigrated while labouring under it. The scrophula, rickets and scurvy, especially the two latter, are rare diseases. Hysteria, hypochondria and insanity, are not uncommon. Dropsy of the brain is met with occasionally. Locked jaw is so rare, that but a single case has occurred here for many years. Apoplexy is scarcely ever seen; but epilepsy is more frequent. Dropsies occur pretty often, but generally as the consequence of intermitting fever. The gout and calculus are seldom seen, and palsies are infrequent. Cancers are uncommon; and no case of

hd phobia has occurred since the settlement of the town. wine madness has not been epidemic for many years. The venomous snakes are so few, that even in the newer settlements a snake-bite is uncommon; and in the neighbourhood of Cincinnati, almost unknown. The coup de soleil, or stroke of the sun, and death from the use of cold water, are not more frequent. Drowning in the Ohio, is an accident which often happens, and one which we are entirely unprepared to remedy, not having the instruments necessary, either for the recovery of the immersed body, or the restoration of life.

As no bills of mortality are kept in this place, it is not known what proportion die annually; what diseases carry off the largest number; or which of the seasons is attended with the greatest mortality-though the two latter may be estimated and expressed in general terms. The cholera infantum is more fatal to children than any other complaint. It is most destructive in the second summer; aggravated, no doubt, by teething, and the miscellaneous food with which children begin to be indulged at that age. Convulsions, in the first month after birth, carry off many; and should perhaps rank next to the cholera infantum in the number of their victims. After this follows the croup, which for the most part attacks those between the ages of six months and two years. Of adults, the greatest number die with bilious and typhous fevers; with pulmonary inflammation, and with affections of the liver, stomach and bowels. In the months of June and July, more children die than in any others. The greatest mortality among adults is generally in August, September and October. When epidemics prevail, this however is otherwise, and the midst of winter is now and then attended with a greater number of deaths than any other part of the year.

SECTION 2. Causes of Disease.

CLIMATE.

Neither the extreme cold, nor the extreme heat of this climate, appears to produce many diseases, by its direct operation. If scurvy, goitre and chilblains arise from cold, that of our climate is not sufficient to produce them. The extremities of those who are much exposed in winter, are occasionally frozen; but there has been no instance of death from such ex

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posure in this country. The most obvious effects of our hot weather are, oppression and lassitude in the muscles, with a diminution of appetite-all of which disappear upon the occurrence of a cool day, and are thereby distinguishable from similar affections produced by marsh exhalation. Few persons escape these complaints; but those who have emigrated from higher latitudes are of course the greatest sufferers. Some aged people, and a few valetudinarians, enjoy better health in our hot, than cold weather. Our children, during the great heats of summer, are liable to rashes, as they are popularly called-cutaneous efflorescences-which are troublesome, but not dangerous; and disappear upon the first occurrence of cool weather. There is even reason to believe these affections salutary, as they frequently appear on the healthiest children. Cholera infantum is not produced by the direct action of heat on the system, but is so much aggravated by that cause, as to be generally incurable during the period in which the thermometer fluctuates between 76 and 96 degrees. The variations of atmospheric temperature are a more potent cause of disease, than either extreme. But they may in a great degree be rendered harmless, by a careful adaptation of clothing, lodging and fire, to the change. This cause usually produces pleurisy, rheumatism and other inflammations-colds, quinsies, croup, tooth ach, &c. uncombined with other complaints;-but when the prevailing disease is a bilious or a typhous fever, it is commonly found, that the affections produced by changes of the weather, partake largely of the symptoms of the epidemic. The best examples of this combination are afforded by the pleurisy and croup. Variations of temperature, particularly changes from heat to cold, are sometimes the exciting causes of intermitting and other fevers, produced by marsh exhalation. In all these cases, the presence of moisture renders the depression of temperature more injurious. To water, indeed, in the form of dew and fog, it is fashionable to ascribe much deleterious power; but there is reason, perhaps, to doubt the correctness of this hypothesis in all cases, when the temperature of the atmosphere is steady.-Fogs and vapors are most abundant, where the decomposition of vegetable matter is greatest; and to this operation should perhaps be attributed most of the diseases which are vulgarly ascribed to moisture.

WATER.

Throughout the Miami country, this is generally hard, from holding in solution carbonate of lime, muriate of soda, muriate of lime, and the other salts afforded by a calcareous region. It is apt, therefore, to disagree with immigrants from a country, such as that east of the Alleghenies, where most of the springs afford soft water. The complaints excited by this cause are for the most part transient; and to the natives of the country, its waters are as salutary and pleasant, as those of the Atlantic states are to the inhabitants of that quarter. Our springs and wells cannot, therefore, be regarded as affording a beverage absolutely prejudicial to health, though it may operate injuriously on strangers for a short period.

MIASMATA.

The Miami country in general being level, ponds and morasses are frequent; especially in the northern part. Most of them might be drained, and certainly will be, at some future period. In the mean time, their environs must continue more or less infested with the diseases which spring from marsh effluvia; and therefore should not be selected for the residence of immigrants. Most of our valleys contain large quantities of alluvion, deposited at various antecedent periods; but whether from these tracts there be any exhalations still arising, which are noxious, is doubtful. The more obvious sources of miasmata, are the marshes formed in these tracts from the annual inundation of their lower portions; and the decaying remains of animals and vegetables deposited in the shores of the streams which flow through them. Whatever may be the truth on this point, it is certain that the valleys are less healthy than the uplands; but from clearing and cultivation, they are annually becoming more salubrious. With respect to Cincinnati, the sources of miasmata may be divided into those which are natural, and those which are artificial; or in other words, into such as are common to it, and other towns on the river, and such as are peculiar, and of our own creation. Of the former, we have but two-the drowned lands at the mouth of Mill creek; and the river beach opposite the town. The former lie so far to the west, and are so much disconnected with the

town by an intervening forest, that our summer winds but seldom blow their exhalations over us. Hence very little agency can be ascribed to this cause. The latter is, perhaps, more efficient. The great depressions of the Ohio, in August and September, expose to the sun a quantity of mud, with trees and some animal matter, in a state of decay; the exhalations from which are unquestionably prejudicial. The erection of the steam mill has augmented this cause; by producing, in high floods, an eddy, which annually deposits on the beach, for a thousand feet along the front of the town, a large quantity of filth and mud. Our artificial sources of disease are incomparably more deleterious. For many years the descent of gravel along the streets which run from the upper to the lower table, has kept several of the intermediate lots in a state of partial inundation, and caused them to accumulate large quantities of filth. Further west, in the same tract, nearly all the bricks hitherto used, were manufactured; and the pits whence the clay was dug, have been constantly receiving, through the gutter in Second Street, nearly all the wash of the town. Thus have we improvidently created, in the very midst of our population, the most offensive and destructive nuisances. Fortunately, the powers of the new corporation enable them to compel the removal or abatement of the whole. The great purification has thus at last been commenced; and although its progress as yet has neither been creditable to the energy of the corporation, honourable to the proprietors of those lots, nor beneficial to the public health, there is great reason to hope for relief at no remote period. When this salutary object is accomplished, our public sources of disease will be so few and inefficient, that we may, without hesitation, expect to see Cincinnati approximating in healthiness, the driest and most elevated situations, remote from the river.

SECTION 3. Mineral Springs.

The western country is abundantly supplied with salines, or salt springs. The richest and most copious are on the bank of Great Kenhawa, in the western part of Virginia. Along with the common salt, muriate of soda, there is a large portion of the muriate of lime, as I have found by examining the bittern or mother water, which seems to consist entirely of that salt. VOL. VI. No. 22.

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