MARCH, 1820.

WINDS.

N. INW.NE. E. [SE. S. JSW. W.

17 13 1

56 287

Atmospheric Constitution, Diseases, &c.

It is no longer a question in philosophy, whether or not man, in his moral and physical capacity, be equally subject to the influence of the seasons and the climate, the atmosphere which he breathes, and the emanations from the soil which he inhabits. This doctrine, which we have received from Hippocrates, was also taught by Aristotle, Plato, and a multitude of other sages, who have successively demonstrated, that life and health were not the product merely of original organization; and that whatever mental or physical attributes man, in his rude and primitive state, was endowed with, they were capable of being improved and perfected by social restrictions, judicious habits, and early fostering cares, which would not only bring into action, but give a proper direction to all those faculties.

This doctrine receives much illustration from the history of human diseases. Our daily observations, as well as the records of medical philosophy, furnish us with the knowledge of epidemics, created by atmospheric vicissitudes, circumscribed by the nature of the soil, the activity of vegetation, &c. which have ravaged for a season, and then suddenly disappeared, not from the want of new subjects to prey upon, but from the operation of great meteorological changes. Hence the most destructive pestilences, which have seemed for a time to threaten the extermination of the human race in large districts of country, have suddenly vanished, leaving no traces in the recollection of surviving generations but the terror of their ravages. But let us be permitted still farther to illustrate this position. The Coan sage, (de aere, locis, et aquis) has extended this doctrine, by attributing to the operation and agency of the atmospheric constitution, the superior strength and vigour of the warlike nations of Europe, over the inhabitants of southern Asia, whose nerves were never

strongly excited, nor their temperaments invigorated, by the successive and alternate changes of heat and cold. Galen has also inculcated on his readers, that virtue, nobleness of mind, and a love of philosophy might be acquired, by studying the results which the various atmospheric changes, in the places which they inhabited, produced on their own systems. The famous Des Cartes still more strongly enforced the same doctrine, by asserting, that the mind of man was so much under the control of organic life, and external agents, that if it were possible to increase his capacity for becoming wiser and more sagacious, this power belonged to medicine.*

From the subjoined tables, it appears that the wind has prevailed from the north and west during 21 days in July, 26 in August, and 29 in September. These are no doubt our salubrious winds; but the long-continued drought that attended them, deprived the earth of its due propor tion of moisture, and rendered the air intensely hot: hence the diseases of the summer are found to have assumed an inflammatory character, with a great tendency to hemorrhagic fluxes, especially from the nose. This symptom occurred very frequently in the Influenza, which has been uncommonly rife during the latter part of August, and the whole of September, and has permitted very few of the inhabitants of this city and neighbouring country to pass through the autumnal season without feeling its effects. though no epidemic, since the year 1802, has been more general in its influence, its symptoms were nevertheless for the most part mild, and have not been attended with those serious pulmonic affections, which at that time marked its progress.

Al

The maximum temperature in July was 90°-83°; is August, 93°-87°, and in September 88°-83°. This extra

* Animus adeo a temperamento et organorum corporis dispositione pendit, ut si aliqua invenire possit, quæ homines sapientiores, et ingeniosiores reddat, quam hactenus fuerunt, credam illam in medicina quæri debere. (De Method. tit. 6. s. 2.)

ordinary high range of the thermometer in our latitude, unattended by rains, accounts, by the absence of miasmatic exhalations, for our comparative exemption from malignant disease. The summer has not, however, been equally dry and cloudless in the more southern parts of our country. Below the latitude of Baltimore there have been more frequent rains, and less atmospheric heat, and hence, at periods unusually late, malignant epidemics have prevailed with unusual virulence, and greater mortality, more particularly at Savannah and New-Orleans.

The northern states have not been entirely exempt from malignant diseases. The city of New-York (which, with the exception above-mentioned, and the ordinary proportion of summer diseases, viz. Cholera, infantile flux, and dysentery, has enjoyed its usual degree of health,) has nevertheless, in one particular quarter, chiefly inhabited by a population poor, destitute, and abandoned, been scourged by a fever of a malignant character, attended with unusual mortality. We forbear to express any opinion on its nature, origin, or diagnostic symptoms, as the Medical Society have instituted an inquiry on this subject, the result of which we hope to be able to lay before our readers in our next number.

Early in June, an alarm of Yellow Fever prevailing in Middletown, a small city on the Connecticut river, our Board of Health was induced to commission Dr. Beck to proceed to that place, and inquire into its origin, character, and extent. From that gentleman's report, it appears that thirteen cases of the disease had occurred between the 3d and 26th of June, of which seven had proved fatal. All the individuals affected, except three girls, who were employed in a cotton factory, 4 miles from the town, had been lately on board of vessels arriving from hot climates, or lived very near to the wharves where these vessels were unladed. In the cases of the three girls, no decisive opinion of the cause of their disease can be given; they may, or may not, have been exposed to take the disease from the same source as the others. Little re