chman would
say, "_l'arbre arteriel cede sa prominance a l'arbre veineuse_,"
spreading coldness, languor and want of energy over the entire system.
The white fluids, or lymphatic temperament, predominating, they are not
so liable as the fair race, to inflammatory diseases of the lungs, or
any other organ; but from the superabundant viscidities and mucosities
of their mucous surfaces, they are more liable to engorgements and
pulmonary congestions than any other race of men. In proof of which I
beg leave to refer your correspondent to a standard work entitled
"Observations sur les Maladies des Negres, par M. Dazille. Paris, 1776."

Pneumonia, without subjective symptoms, is very common among them.
Diphtheretic affections, so common among white children, are very rare
among negroes. Intercurrent Pneumonia is more common among them than any
other class of people. It is met with in Typhoid fevers, Rheumatism and
hepatic derangements, to which they are very liable in the cold season.
The local malady requires a different treatment, to correspond with the
general disorder. Bad, vicious, ungovernable negroes are subject, to
what might properly be termed, Scorbutic Pneumonia--a blood disease,
requiring anti-scorbutics. Scorbutic negroes are always vicious or
worthless. A course of anti-scorbutics will reform their morals, and
make good negroes out of worthless ones. They are liable to suffocative
orthopnoea after measles, and die unless bled and purged. But purgatives
are injurious in almost all their other affections involving the
respiratory organs, except such as act especially on the liver. They
check expectoration, says Dazille, and lay the foundations of those
effusions and depots of matter so often mistaken for genuine Phthisis.
Auscultation cannot well be made available with them. The nose pleads to
the eye and touch to form the diagnosis, without calling into
requisition the ear. A single examination by auscultation, in persons
abounding with so much phlegm, is not sufficient to arrive at a correct
diagnosis. Repeated examinations in various postures are too tedious in
execution, and too offensive to the auscultator, to come into general
use in diagnosing the diseases of the Melanic race. This valuable mode
of exploration, so useful in many cases, as practiced by experts, has of
late years been carried to a ridiculous extreme, in being made to
deceive and delude more practitioners than it enlightens, from the haste
and