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ATMOSPHERICAL VICISSITUDES.

261

The very circumstance, in short, which forms the charm, the attraction, the theme of praise in the Italian climate, is that which renders it dangerous, because deceitful-namely, the long intervals of fine weather between vicissitudes of great magnitude. This is the bane of Italy, whose brilliant suns and balmy zephyrs flatter only to betray. They first enervate the constitution; and, when the body is ripe for the impression of the TRAMONTANE, that ruthless blast descends from the mountains on its hapless victim, more fierce and destructive than the outlawed bandit on the unsuspecting traveller !

Italy boasts much of the dryness of her climate. In some places, as at Pisa, there falls as much rain as in Cornwall. In Rome, about one-third less of rain falls than at Penzance, and the number of rainy days is one-third less-being about 117 in the year. This is a poor counterbalance for the steam of the Sirocco, and the oppressive stillness of the Roman air. The fogs of England and its cloudy skies furnish constant themes of querulous complaint; but they would be rich treats in Italy, as defences against the torrents of liquid fire that pour down on her vales from a nearly vertical sun in Summer. As rains fall in Italy more seldom than in England, they make up for this infrequency, by precipitating themselves in cataracts, that form mountain torrents which overflow their banks, flood the plains, and saturate every inch of ground with humidity. The deluge over, a powerful sun bursts forth, and rapidly exhales into the air, not only the aqueous vapour from the soil, but the miasmata generated by the decomposition of all the vegetable and animal substances which the rains have destroyed, the floods carried down from the mountains, or the gutters swept out of the streets. If these exhalations rise into the air perfumed with the aroma of ten thousand odoriferous shrubs, breathing their balmy influence over the face of a smiling landscape, they are not the less, but the more dangerous on that account.

Northern strangers, and more especially INVALIDS, unaccustomed to an azure sky and a genial atmosphere in the depth of

Winter, sally forth to enjoy the glorious sunshine or resplendent moonlight of Italy-and, like the Grecian shepherds—

-Exulting in the sight,

Eye the blue vault, and bless the cheerful light!

But they have, too often, reason to curse, in the sequel, the seductive climate of this classic soil, which mingles the poisonous miasma with the refreshing breeze, and thus conveys the germ of future maladies on the wings of fragrant Zephyrs.*

And now having glanced rapidly at the physical features of the climate of Italy, it is natural to inquire what are its general effects on the inhabitants of that renowned territory?

The records of antiquity afford scanty materials for estimating the influence of climate on the ancient Romans. And if these records were more complete, they would probably throw but little light on the present inquiry. The climate of Italy has undergone nearly as great a revolution as the political power or moral circumstances of its inhabitants, since the commencement of the Christian æra. In the time of OVID, the Black Sea, on whose dreary shores the effeminate poet ended his days in hopeless, and rather unmanly exile, was sometimes locked up in ice for years in succession. PLINY, the younger, informs us that he was unable to raise the olive and myrtle, in the open air, at his country seat in Tuscany, where they now flourish so luxuriantly. The poets are full of descriptions of the frozen Tiber, and the cold of Italy, during Winter. The cold is still felt; but the ice and snow of the plains and rivers have nearly disappeared. The land itself has undergone great revolutions by earthquakes and subterranean fires. The eastern, or Adriatic side of Italy appears to have become elevated, and the western shore de

* “This must suffice for the pure, the bright, the fragrant, the classical air of Italy, the Paradise of Europe. To such a pest-house are its blue skies the canopy-and where its bright sun holds out the promise of life and joy, it is but to inflict misery and death. To him who knows what this land is, the sweetest breeze of Summer is attended by an unavoidable sense of fear—and he who, in the language of the poets, wooes the balmy Zephyr of the evening, finds death in its blandishments."-Macculloch.

COMPARATIVE LONGEVITY IN ITALY AND ENGLAND. 263

pressed, within the last 2000 years. RAVENNA, which was once the Portsmouth of Italy, is now some miles from the sea. The PONTINE MARSHES, which can hardly keep their heads above water at present, (and which, it is to be hoped, will soon be covered by the Mediterranean wave) were once the seat of some half a hundred cities or towns!! These revolutions have been ridiculously attributed to the encroachment or retrocession of the ocean. Foolish hypothesis! Water will always preserve its level, however land may rise or sink.

The earliest authority, on the subject of longevity, among the Romans, is ULPIANUS, secretary and minister of Alexander Severus, According to him, a register was kept of the age, sex, diseases, and death of the ROMAN CITIZENS from the time of Servius Tullius to Justinian, comprehending a period of ten consecutive centuries. The mortality of the great mass of the population, however, consisting of slaves, &c. is left out of sight—and, consequently, Ulpianus's tables relate to what may be termed picked lives.

"From observations formed on 1000 years, the expectation, or mean term of Roman life, has been fixed at thirty years. To make a just comparison of the value of life in Rome and in England, we must select subjects in England similarly circumstanced, of a condition relatively easy: and the result discloses an extension of life remarkably in our favour. Mr. Finlayson has ascertained, from very extensive observation, on the decrement of life prevailing among the nominees of the tontines, and other life annuities granted by authority of Parliament, during the last forty years, that the expectation of life is above fifty years for persons thus situated, which affords our easy classes a superiority of twenty years above the Roman citizen. The expectation of life for the whole mass of Britain is at least one in forty-five, which affords to all our classes a superiority of fifteen years above even the easy classes of the Romans."*

*Hawkins's Statistics, p. 7.

It appears, from the same author, that the probability of life, for the whole

But, descending at once from antiquity to our own times, let us compare the decrement of human life in the two MODERN BABYLONS, Rome and London. "On an average (says Hawkins) of the ten years from 1816 to 1826, the annual mortality, in Rome, was 1 in 244." That is, out of every 25 individuals, in the Eternal City, one was annually buried. In Naples the ratio of mortality is somewhat less-being 1 in 28 annually. Let us now look to London. The rate of mortality there is, annually, 1 in 40. In England generally it is 1 in 60. In Paris, it is 1 in 32-in France generally it is 1 in 40 (the same as London, and 20 more unfavourable than England.) In Nice, it is 1 in 31-in Glasgow, it is 1 in 44.-In the Pays de Vaud, 1 in 49, or 11 more unfavourable than England generally.*

These statistical facts substantiate, in the most unequivocal manner, the conclusions which an attentive observer would naturally draw from a survey of the inhabitants, an examination of the soil, and an experience of the climate of Italy—namely, that this portion of the earth is much less favourable to the health and longevity of man than England. But the question may be raised-is the climate of Italy injurious to strangers who are only temporary residents in that country? This question, I conceive, hinges essentially on the extent of the temporary residence. If the sojourn continues during a whole yearthat is, throughout the entire range of the seasons, I think injury, of greater or less amount, will be sustained by the constitution—not perhaps in the shape of immediate or actual illness, but in the reception of those germs of disease which are afterwards to take on activity and growth.

The opinions which have been broached or entertained by medical writers, both in this and other countries, respecting the

population of Florence (one of the healthiest parts of Italy) is the same, at this time, as that of the easy class of Romans in the days of Ulpianus—namely, fifteen years less than that of the inhabitants of the aspersed climate of Great Britain!

*Hawkins' Statistics.

DANGER OP LONG RESIDENCE.

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medicinal effects of certain places of resort, should be received with caution, if not with distrust. If half the diseases which are said to be cured by Cheltenham, Bath, Harrogate, and other places, were really arrested in their course, we cannot help wondering that any one should be suffered to die in these islands. But however delicious may be the climates of Rome, Naples, Pisa, &c. we find that the greater number of medical practitioners, as well as English families, leave these interesting spots in the Summer, and place the Alps between them and fair Italy. Of those who remain on the Italian side of these mountains, all who can afford the time or expense, remove to certain localities, where the air is more cool, and the malaria less prevalent than in the cities and on the plains.

There are some, whose circumstances or inclinations induce them to remain permanently in Florence, Rome, and Naples. Very few of these last fail to exhibit the marks of a deleterious climate in their countenances.* Even those who enjoy the advantage of migration to Switzerland during the malarious season, acknowledge that they begin to feel the depressive and injurious effects of the Roman air from the time they cross the Apennines on their return to the Eternal City.

That people in health may wander through Italy, in safety, at all periods between September and June, I can have no doubt. Nor is it probable that even a sedentary residence in that classic land would be injurious during the Winter, with common precaution against the climate. If this view of the subject be correct, it abridges not the rational pleasure of a tour through the most renowned country on the surface of this globe-a tour capable of affording instruction as well as pleasure—and, what, perhaps, is superior to both—a conviction, on returning, that ENGLAND, with all its faults and imperfections,

* I have recently seen three or four examples of paralysis in young gentlemen who travelled through Italy in the Summer, and consequently were exposed to malaria at the time when it is most in activity.

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