The
malaria, as we call it, though the term is unknown to Romans, is never
so dangerous as after a slight rain, just sufficient to wet the surface
of the earth without deeply penetrating it; for decomposition is then
stimulated, and the miasma arising from the Campagna is blown abroad.
So long as the earth is dry, there is no danger of fever, except at
morning and nightfall, and then simply because of the heavy dews which
the porous and baked earth then inhales and expires. After the autumn
has given a thorough, drenching rain, Rome is healthy and free from
fever.
Rome has with strangers the reputation of being unhealthy; but this
opinion I cannot think well founded,--to the extent, at least, of the
common belief. The diseases of children there are ordinarily very
light, while in America and England they are terrible. Scarlet and
typhus fevers, those fearful scourges in the North, are known at Rome
only under most mitigated forms. Cholera has shown no virulence there;
and for diseases of the throat and lungs the air alone is almost
curative. The great curse of the place is the intermittent fever, in
which any other illness is apt to end. But this, except in its peculiar
phase of _Perniciosa_, though a very annoying, is by no means a
dangerous disease, and has the additional advantage of a specific
remedy.
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