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Besides, the constitution of the European being 
more highly braced by his climate, his blood,
when exposed to an American or West-India sun, 
is, more easily inflamed, and excited to the heat 
of fever. These causes, however, of the diminish-
ed sensation of heat in the negro, are not peculiar, 
exclusively, to that race. Europeans, introduced
into a southern climate, if they do not fall victims
to the first attacks of fever, induced in consequence
of excessive heat acting on a system too highly 
toned, commonly suffer from these fevers, which are 
chiefly of the bilious kind, a considerable relaxation
of its tension, with a proportionable discolouration of 
the skin. when the constitution has been, in this manner broken down, and fitted to its new situation,
it is always found to become more tolerant of heat;
as it is also rendered more impatient of cold. 
It is a fact, likewise, whether it arise from the 
increased copiousness of insensible perspiration, or
the reduced temperature of the system, or from any
other cause, that they, and their descendants, are 
less liable than immediate emigrants from Europe
or the inhabitants of the northern states of America,
to certain epidemic, or contagious disorders which
belong to the climate, or have been introduced by

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belong to the climate, or have been introduced by 
infection from abroad. From the yellow fever, 
which prevailed in most of the sea ports of the Unit-
ed States during several seasons between the years
1790, and 1800,  the negroes suffered less than the 
Anglo-Americans. But this was equally true of 
the French refugees from the island of St. Domingo
whom the calamities of their country, as that period,
had driven, in great numbers, to seek an asylum
on the continent.*

The negroes, says this writer again, are more
short-lived than the whites. From what data he 
has drawn this conclusion I know not, except it 
be from the excessive mortality in several of the 
British West-India islands induced by the sever-
ity of their servitude: but as far as our expe-
rience on the continent can furnish an inference,
wherever the slaves are not exhausted by hard
treatment, and excessive labors, it is not true. It
is known in all the southern states, that the slaves, 

[[ footnote]]] * A species of the yellow fever may be said to be indigenous
in many of the West-India islands. It is less dangerous how-ever, to natives whose constitution has been assimilated to the climate. But to strangers either from Europe, or the United
States of America, it is almost certainly fatal.
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---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-05 14:51:05