If you wish to keep your health in Italy, follow the example of the
Italians. Eat a third less than you are accustomed to at home. Do not
drink habitually of brandy, porter, ale, or even Marsala, but confine
yourselves to the lighter wines of the country or of France. Do not
walk much in the sun; "only Englishmen and dogs" do that, as the
proverb goes; and especially take heed not to expose yourself, when
warm, to any sudden changes of temperature. If you have heated yourself
with walking in the sun, be careful not to go at once, and especially
towards nightfall, into the lower and shaded streets, which have begun
to gather the damps, and which are kept cool by the high, thick walls
of the houses. Remember that the difference of temperature is very
great between the narrow, shaded streets and the high, sunny Pincio. If
you have the misfortune to be of the male sex, and especially if you
suffer under the sorrow of the first great Caesar in being bald, buy
yourself a little skullcap, (it is as good as his laurels for the
purpose,) and put it on your head whenever you enter the churches and
cold galleries. Almost every fever here is the result of suddenly
checked transpiration of the skin; and if you will take the precaution
to cool yourself before entering churches and galleries, and not to
expose yourself while warm to sudden changes of temperature, you may
live twenty years in Rome without a fever.
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