And thus likewise have I seen several people, (especially new-comers,) so intemperate in devouring the pleasant fruits, that they have fallen into dangerous fluxes and surfeits. These, and such like disorders, are the chief occasions of their diseases.
§ 83. The first sickness that any new-comer happens to have there, he unfairly calls a seasoning, be it fever, ague, or any thing else, that his own folly or excesses bring upon him.
Their intermitting fevers, as well as their agues, are very troublesome, if a fit remedy be not applied; but of late the doctors there have made use of the Cortex Peruviana with success, and find that it seldom or never fails to remove the fits. The planters, too, have several roots natural to the country, which in this case they cry up as infallible; and I have found by many examples a total immersion in cold spring water, just at the accession of the fit an infallible cure.
§ 84. When these damps, colds and disorders affect the body more gently, and do not seize people violently at first; then for want of some timely application, (the planters abhorring all physic, except in desperate cases,) these small disorders are suffered to go on, until they grow into a cachexia, by which the body is overrun with obstinate scorbutic humors. And this in a more fierce, and virulent degree, I take to be the yaws.
§ 85. The gripes is a distemper of the Caribbee islands, not of that country, and seldom gets footing there, and then only upon great provocations; namely, by the intemperance before mentioned, together with an unreasonable use of filthy and unclean drinks. Perhaps too it may come by new unfine cider, perry or peach drink, which the people are impatient to drink before it is ready; or by the excessive use of lime juice, and foul sugar in punch and flip; or else by the constant drinking of uncorrected beer, made of such windy unwholesome things as some people make use of in brewing.
Thus having fairly reckoned up the principal inconveniences of the climate, and the distempers incident to the country, I shall add a chapter of the recreations and amusements used there, and proceed to the natural benefits they enjoy. After which, I shall conclude with some hints concerning their trade and improvements.