number of cases of tubercle, anaemia,
and dyspepsia, of beri-beri and scurvy, all largely attributable to
poverty of diet, is very great; and the relative poverty, even
compared with that of the countries which I have been privileged to
visit, is piteous. The solution of such a problem does not, however,
lie in removing a people from their environment, but in trying to make
the environment more fit for human habitation.

The hospitality of the people is unstinted and beautiful. They will
turn out of their beds at any time to make a stranger comfortable, and
offer him their last crust into the bargain, without ever expecting or
asking a penny of recompense. But here, as all the world over, the
sublime and the ridiculous go hand in hand. On one of my dog trips
the first winter which I spent at St. Anthony, the bench on which I
slept was the top of the box used for hens. This would have made
little difference to me, but unfortunately it contained a youthful and
vigorous rooster, which, mistaking the arrival of so many visitors for
some strange herald of morning, proceeded every half-hour to salute it
with premature and misdirected zeal, utterly incompatible with
unbroken repose just above his head. It was possible, without moving
one's limbs much, to reach through the bars and suggest better things
to him; but owing to the inequality which exists in most things, one
invariably captured a drowsy hen, while the more active offender
eluded one with ease. Lighting matches to differentiate species under
such exceptional circumstances in the pursuit of knowledge was quite
out of the question.

A visit to one house on the French shore I shall not easily forget.
The poor lad of sixteen years had hip disease, and lay dying. The
indescribable dirt I cannot here picture. The bed, the house, and
everything in it were full of vermin, and the poor boy had not been
washed since he took to bed three or four months before. With the help
of a clergyman who was travelling with me at the time, the lad was
chloroformed and washed. We then ordered the bedding to be burned,
provided him with fresh garments, and put him into a clean bed. The
people's explanation was that he was in too much pain to be touched,
and so they could do nothing. We cleansed and drained his wounds and
left what we could for him. Had he not been so far gone, we should
have taken him to the hospital, but I feared that he would not survive
the journey.

Although at the