cultivate
grapes and mangoes to a considerable extent, both of which sell well in
Pernambuco, bringing a better price than those cultivated elsewhere in
the province. Good grapes I bought at tenpence a pound, but they give
the cultivator a great deal of trouble, as the vines are sure to be
attacked by a large brown ant, and stripped of their leaves in a single
night, unless care be taken to have the lower part of the stem isolated
by water. The whole of the province of Pernambuco is much over-run by
these insects. During the time of our visit the mangoes were just
getting into season, and I found them to be very much superior in
flavour to any I had previously tasted; they are much smaller than
those cultivated near Pernambuco, and very much resemble peaches in
colour.
During
the few days we remained on the island we made many excursions through
it in all directions; instead of the almost uniformly level character
of the country in the vicinity of Pernambuco, here there is a gentle
undulation of hill and dale. There is not much large timber, the wooded
portions generally consist of small trees and shrubs, which give to
many parts of the island an aspect more like that of an English
orchard, than an uncultivated equatorial region; some of the views we
obtained from the hills, if not grand, were at least pleasing. Though
there are both a priest and a lawyer on the island, there is no medical
man; and as soon as I was known to be one, my assistance was solicited
from all quarters. The first individual I was requested to visit, was a
man with a large abscess in the neck, from the suppuration of the right
submaxillary gland; he could neither speak nor swallow, and his
relatives thought him on the point of death. I opened the abscess,
which gave him instant relief, and next day when I called, he was
sitting up, and able to overwhelm me with thanks for what he conceived
to be a miraculous cure. This case so established my reputation, that I
had more medical practice than I desired. Two of my patients were in
the last stage of consumption, but by far the greater proportion of the
cases resulted from intermittent fever, chiefly arising from
derangement of the digestive organs, accompanied with enlargement of
the spleen.
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