Dr. Unanue
States That Hydrophobia Was First Known In South
America In 1803:
This statement is corroborated by Azara
and Ulloa having never heard of it in their time.
Dr. Unanue
says that it broke out in Central America, and slowly
travelled southward. It reached Arequipa in 1807; and it is
said that some men there, who had not been bitten, were
affected, as were some negroes, who had eaten a bullock
which had died of hydrophobia. At Ica forty-two people thus
miserably perished. The disease came on between twelve
and ninety days after the bite; and in those cases where it
did come on, death ensued invariably within five days. After
1808, a long interval ensued without any cases. On inquiry,
I did not hear of hydrophobia in Van Diemen's Land, or in
Australia; and Burchell says, that during the five years he
was at the Cape of Good Hope, he never heard of an instance
of it. Webster asserts that at the Azores hydrophobia has
never occurred; and the same assertion has been made with
respect to Mauritius and St. Helena. [2] In so strange a disease
some information might possibly be gained by considering
the circumstances under which it originates in distant climates;
for it is improbable that a dog already bitten, should
have been brought to these distant countries.
At night, a stranger arrived at the house of Don Benito,
and asked permission to sleep there. He said he had been
wandering about the mountains for seventeen days, having
lost his way. He started from Guasco, and being accustomed
to travelling in the Cordillera, did not expect any difficulty
in following the track to Copiapo; but he soon became
involved in a labyrinth of mountains, whence he could not
escape. Some of his mules had fallen over precipices, and he
had been in great distress. His chief difficulty arose from
not knowing where to find water in the lower country, so that
he was obliged to keep bordering the central ranges.
We returned down the valley, and on the 22nd reached
the town of Copiapo. The lower part of the valley is broad,
forming a fine plain like that of Quillota. The town covers
a considerable space of ground, each house possessing a garden:
but it is an uncomfortable place, and the dwellings are
poorly furnished. Every one seems bent on the one object
of making money, and then migrating as quickly as possible.
All the inhabitants are more or less directly concerned with
mines; and mines and ores are the sole subjects of conversation.
Necessaries of all sorts are extremely dear; as the
distance from the town to the port is eighteen leagues, and
the land carriage very expensive. A fowl costs five or six
shillings; meat is nearly as dear as in England; firewood,
or rather sticks, are brought on donkeys from a distance of
two and three days' journey within the Cordillera; and pasturage
for animals is a shilling a day: all this for South
America is wonderfully exorbitant.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 283 of 402
Words from 146105 to 146611
of 208183
