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2 being pestered at the Cape by beggars, a peculiarity I do not
3 recollect to have met with in any other place I visited in my
4 travels.
5 On our arrival at the Cape, the harvest season was just over,
6 and we were able, on our walks through the town, or in country
7 excursions, to refresh ourselves with some of the most delicious
8 grapes I ever tasted. To some of my readers, it may, at first,
9 appear strange, that the harvest season should be over so early in
10 the year as April ; but, be it remembered, the Cape is in
11 the southern hemisphere, where the seasons are precisely the
12 reverse of ours; January being the hottest, and July the coldest
13 month of the year. After a stay of four days, we again put
14 to sea, having, during that time, taken in a supply of fresh
15 water, poultry, &c. but we had not long been out of sight
16 of land, when our poultry were attacked by an epizootic,
17 and destroyed, so that we were obliged to call at St. Helena,
18 to procure fresh provisions. There were a few cases of deatli
19 on board, viz. some invalids and a sailor who had been noto-
20 rious for his immoderate drinking. The bodies were, accord-
21 ing to the custom of mariners, wrapped in linen cloths, and
22 weights having been attached, they were committed to the
23 deep, accompanied with prayers.
24 Besides these cases of disease, which terminated fatally,
25 there were a few others, with regard to the treatment of
26 which I was consulted. I may mention two of them, as the
27 diseases frequently occur, and I had the good fortune to ex-
28 tricate the ship's surgeon from an embarrassment respecting
29 them. The first was that of a testy old colonel, who, accord-
30 ing to his own assertion, was troubled with severe rheumatic
31 pains to such a degree, that he was on the verge of despair. In
32 this perplexity he addressed himself to me, with the avowal,
33 that the medicines he got from the surgeon were not worth
34 a penny, and that if I could not assist him, he must die. I
35 asked him, whether he had ever been affected with syphilitic
36 disease, which he admitted to have been the case many years
37 before. I, therefore, acquainted the surgeon with this circum-