a race of mortals, reduced to the most lamentable condition of animal existence and mental imbecility.

From the Valais country of Switzerland I determined to cross the mighty Simplon, and to commence my route in Italy by the plains of Lombardy.

This sublime mountain pass, worthy of the wonderful conceptions of Napoleon, is an object of interest to all travellers. No one can form an idea of its fearful grandeur, scaling, as it does, the Alpine summits, up to the region of perpetual snows, and often obscured in its highest part with clouds and driving snow-storms, even during the midst of summer heats below. It was left for the gigantic mind of Napoleon, his genius soaring literally to the clouds, to project and accomplish this stupendous work, which must be seen to be realized. It is easily to be comprehended that an intellect only like that of the French emperor, associated with that daring courage and unconquerable perseverance that could conduct an army across the Great St. Bernard in the depths of winter, must be of the high order fitted to execute the magnificent work which he afterward achieved in the construction of the Simplon.

This consummated for him the dreams of his irrepressible ambition, opened to him the gates of Milan, and led to the conquest of Lombardy and the glorious victories of Marengo and of Lodi.

LOMBARDY.

THE beautiful plains of Lombardy, covered with vineyards and teeming with luxurious cultivation, offered me a delicious treat, in contrast with the dangerous. gorges and cold Alpine ranges through which I had passed only the day before.

The comfortable town of Domo d'Ossola and the expanse of Lago Maggiore, with its enchanting islands, are the first to greet the footsteps of the wearied traveller on descending from the lofty Alps into the Sardinian territory. Reposing here for a day or two to refresh ourselves, and to enjoy the beauties of the romantic islands of Isola Bella and Isola Madre, we resumed our journey, and proceeded to the splendid city of Milan, the capital of the present Lombardo-Venetian States.

The city of Milan is situated on the extensive plains of Lombardy, about forty miles from the Alps, and having in the distant view to the east the range of the Apennines. It is a more regularly laid out and uniformly and beautifully built capital, and reminded me more of the modern cities of Great Britain and our own country, than any other in Italy.

On entering this superb city by the Simplon Gate, we were struck also with the magnificence and symmetrical simplicity of this structure; and among the objects on it that must arrest the attention of the traveller, are the finely-executed bas-reliefs of numerous battle pieces with which it is decorated. Upon closer inspection of them our surprise was not a little excited by discovering that they were intended to represent the minor and incon

siderable victories of the Austrians, the present occupants of this fertile region, rather than the truly glorious triumphs of the Great Captain who projected and completed the mighty road over the Alps, which this gateway at its termination was designed to commemorate.

Among the public edifices, one of the most attractive and beautiful throughout Italy, though smaller than many other temples of religious worship which we visited, was the celebrated Duomo, which is built entirely of white marble, in the Gothic style of architecture, presenting a purity and chasteness from its snow-white colour and exquisite workmanship, that seemed in admirable harmony with the purposes to which it is consecrated.

On the roof it is ornamented with a great variety of busts, among which we were pleased to see one of superb chiselling representing the Emperor Napoleon, under whose orders this noble edifice was completed. The cicerone took great pride in pointing this out to us; for all the Italians look upon Napoleon, not as a conqueror, but as their own blood countryman, as he was; as their protector and benefactor, the patron of the fine arts, and the reviver of their former imperial glories under the Casars and the Medici.

In the interior of this magnificent structure is the tomb of their favourite saint and patron, Carlo Boromeo, whose body, in an exsiccated and well-preserved state, is open. to inspection, being enclosed in a glass coffin of the most elaborate construction imaginable, ornamented with the richest devices and imagery. Within the coffin are seen various pious offerings in the shape of amulets, chaplets, and jewelry of the most precious and costly description, altogether constituting this sepulchral monument a bijou indeed, that has, we believe, no parallel.

N

In a professional point of view, I found the civil hospital one of extreme interest, of ample construction, and under excellent regulations, containing many hundred patients. Among the objects of disease which most attracted my attention, was that peculiar affection of the skin and lower extremities prevalent in this part of Italy, and denominated the Pellagra.

In this extended and beautiful plain of Venetian Lombardy, imbosomed within the Alps and Apennines, and teeming with vegetation, it might naturally be expected, from the great humidity and abundance of malaria, that diseases of the extreme parts of the body, and of the cutaneous and lymphatic systems, would be produced. This malady seems to me to consist of a languidness in the functions of the skin and debility of the lymphatic vessels, showing itself in hypertrophic enlargements of the integuments and of the adipose and cellular tissues; and, from the observations I made, the general atony and exhaustion of the vascular system was strikingly manifested by the remarkable feebleness of the action of the heart and arteries, and the consequent diminution of energy in the cerebral functions; the latter seeming to be the effect of the progressive march of the disease throughout the system, the constitution not being originally affected, but consecutively so, by the extension of the primary disease.

It occurs, too, in the class of labouring persons, who are more exposed to the malarious influence of the climate, and who are predisposed, indeed, to all diseases of debility by the privations they suffer from defective nourishment and confined and unwholesome habitations.

In the observations which I afterward made in Greece, and in Egypt, and in other parts of the East, and which I shall shortly speak of, I was impressed with the great

similarity, in some respects, between this peculiar Italian malady of Pellagra and the Lepra and Elephantiasis.

The extreme penury of the system in the poorer classes of the Italians of Lombardy, is not unlike what we met with among the peasantry of Greece and the modern Arabs of Egypt and its deserts; for, although the climates and topographical peculiarities of these several countries are very dissimilar, there are causes operative in each which must produce similar effects. And from what we noticed ourselves in journeying in these different regions, we are convinced of the truth of the analogy in question.

In Lombardy, we may also remark that a vast proportion of the prevailing type of diseases are of paludal origin. Hence the frequency of Intermittents and Remittents, and of Hepatic and Splenic congestions in all their complications, which is in farther corroboration of the malarious influence which we have ventured to suggest as one of the primary causes of Pellagrous affections.

In my visits to the hospital of Milan, my attention was pleasingly arrested by several monumental tablets which I noticed in the portico; and which, upon examination, I found to be bas-reliefs and inscriptions in honour of distinguished members of the medical profession deceased, who had formerly been attached to this valued charity a just tribute of public gratitude to their worth, and a homage to their services in the cause of humanity, which I nowhere else noticed in my travels to have been paid to our profession.

In the vicinity, and not far distant from Milan, is the renowned city of Pavia, distinguished as the birthplace and residence of the immortal SCARPA, who may truly be said to have been the John Hunter of Italy. But Scarpa is no more. The sun of surgical science in