Port au Prince, Sept. 1797.
Seeing, by the map, that I am removed to a station many degrees more
distant from the equator, you will not expect that I should find the
heat greater at St. Domingo, than I had felt it at Demarara; but it has
been remarkable that the temperature has risen progressively as we have
proceeded further to the north. At Martinique it was hotter than in the
colonies of Guiana: at Jamaica the heat was more intense than at
Martinique; and, at St. Domingo, the mercury is higher than it was in
Jamaica.
From the bare statement of this fact, it might seem to be at variance
with a great general law of nature; but, upon a closer view, it is found
to proceed entirely from situation, and other local causes. The
settlements, upon the coast of South America, are formed of an extended
flat surface of land, at the border of the sea; the towns being small
and open, and not crowded: while, in the islands, the free current of
air is interrupted by woods and mountains; and the towns, which are
closer built, with narrower streets, and a more crowded population, are
most unwisely placed under hills, or lofty promontories, where both the
direct and reflected rays of the sun are concentrated as in a furnace;
or they are erected at the confines of the deepest bays, whither the
refreshing breeze can seldom penetrate. Hence you will perceive how it
may readily occur as a mere effect of situation, that the temperature
should be higher here, than in places nearer the equator.
In the colonies of Demarara and Berbische, at only six or seven degrees
of north latitude, the heat, at noon, in the shade, very rarely exceeds
86°: at Martinique, I seldom saw the thermometer above 88°: in the shade
of sandy Kingston, at Jamaica, it rose sometimes to 90°: and, at Port au
Prince in St. Domingo, about 19° north latitude, it is often as high as
93°. But, here, many of the common causes of increased temperature are
strongly combined, while in the colonies of Guiana there are neither
rocks, nor hills, nor deep bays, but the broad surface is open to the
full influence of the breeze, besides being spread with a luxuriant
verdure, and intersected with canals, and wide ditches of water.
At Demarara, the heat of my bed-room, during the night, seldom exceeded
76°. Here I sleep in a climate of 83°; and feel very sensibly chilled if
the thermometer fall as low as 75°. Only a few days ago I sat down to
write, without particularly noticing the heat of the room, and, upon
finding myself unable to proceed, in consequence of an unusual flow of
perspiration falling upon the paper, from the back of my hand, I looked
at the thermometer and found the mercury at 96°. I removed, without
delay, into a cooler part of the house, but, in the course of a few
minutes, was attacked with severe head-ach, and excessive thirst; my
face became flushed; and, for a short time, my skin felt dry and
parched. Perhaps, in a person newly arrived in these latitudes, or in
one of a different habit of body, these symptoms would have constituted
an accession of fever, which, in the course of twenty or thirty hours,
might have proved fatal.
We have been exceedingly inconvenienced lately by a dry land-wind, from
the east, which was equally parching, as the distressing siroc of the
hot regions of the old continent, and induced, very generally, the
painful symptoms of influenza. Almost every person was heard sneezing as
he walked along the streets. I was seized with great severity—my head,
eyes, nose and throat, were in pain, and the air, as it passed into the
lungs, felt hot and dry, irritating the membrane of the nose to an
excessive degree. The attack was sudden—its effects continued three or
four days, when, upon the wind changing, and the refreshing breeze
returning, the malady rapidly dissolved away, in the defluxion of common
catarrh. Whites and blacks, and persons of all the different shades of
colour, were alike afflicted.
During these days of suffering the thermometer, in my room, was at 82°
in the morning, from 93° to 95° at noon, and 84° in the evening.
In selecting situations for establishing the towns in this climate, as
in most others, the preservation of health has been less considered than
the convenience of commerce. The French colonists appear to have been
more solicitous regarding the supply of water, than respecting the
temperature, or purity of the air. At Port au Prince, large sums of
money have been expended to convey water to the town, by means of
aqueducts from the rivers. Several large fountains have been erected,
which afford an ample portion for household uses: open courses have also
been constructed for the purpose of conducting small streams through the
different streets: but these, not flowing rapidly, like those in the
town of St. Pierre, are apt to grow stagnant and dirty, insomuch that
they frequently become foul ditches. A further evil is likewise felt,
from the deficiency of current; for Port au Prince, like St. Pierre and
old Edinburgh, offers not the convenience of certain appendages to the
houses, which, in England, are esteemed as indispensable as chimnies;
but the odoriferous riches are consigned to the open channels of the
streets, rendering them receptacles which cause no small annoyance to
our unpractised olfactories.
Horses and mules appear to be more commonly employed for the purposes of
labour, at Port au Prince, than at any place I have yet seen in the West
Indies. Corn, Guinea grass, cane-tops, &c. &c. are drawn about in small
carts by five mules harnessed abreast, and driven by a negro mounted
upon the top of the load. This is an unseemly manner of guiding the
team; but it is pleasing to find the slaves thus relieved from much of
their heaviest toil. Kittarines[12], and horses for pleasure, are less
in use, than in Jamaica; nor do we here observe the same marks of
opulence and splendour, which display themselves among the inhabitants
of Kingston: villas, pens, and country-houses, at a short distance from
the town, are far less numerous. The merchants do not leave their
dwellings, and retire to the country at night, but content themselves
with a single establishment, making the house of business their constant
and only place of residence.
Dancing, gaming, and the common round of amusements, are more prevalent
than in the English colonies, and pursued with greater avidity. The
French have a strong passion for play, and would be as dissatisfied
without the gaming-table, as an Englishman without his newspaper. It
forms a species of intrigue, in which they have the gratification of
imagining themselves to outwit each other. Without intrigue of some sort
they would be overwhelmed with ennui: give them plays, dancing, and the
gaming-table, and they care very little about liberty and equality:
deprive them of their amusements,—do away the intrigue of the table, and
they will cabal in politics; or run into other wild excesses.
This disposition for gaming has been turned, in some measure, to an
useful account, by converting it into a source of revenue to the
government. It will surprise you to learn, that the proprietors of one
of these banks, in Port au Prince, pay the enormous tax of eight hundred
dollars per month, for the license to keep a table; besides sixteen joes
per day, as rent to the owner of the house, who, for this sum, engages
also to provide the attending multitude with porter, wine, and other
refreshments. What must be their profits to enable them to support such
an expenditure? The scene which presents itself at these crowded places
of resort is equally surprising and afflicting. The anxious throng,
pressing round the table, breathe a noxious atmosphere, in a heat almost
equal to that of an oven; but, alike insensible to the destructive
temperature about them, and the streams of perspiration in which their
persons are dissolving, their anxious countenances betray only the
passions induced by this unhappy pursuit: joy, disappointment, and
despair appear, in all their various shades, amidst the crowd, each
painted in rapid succession upon the same brow. Only a few evenings ago,
a Frenchman committed suicide, in consequence of having lost all his
property, at this infatuating table. This too common effect of gaming is
said to happen less frequently among the French, than among the people
of other nations. Upon the volatile character of Frenchmen, misfortune
makes only a slight impression: their vanity, which they seek to dignify
with the character of philosophy, shields them from despair. It is not
uncommon to hear them boast of their fortitude in supporting evils,
which would cause an Englishman to put a pistol to his head: but their
wants are fewer than his, and more easily supplied: they have more
resources; and can more readily submit to the humble means of regaining
their comforts: besides which, their sentiments of dignity and
consequence are, perhaps, less chaste and elevated—whence they have not
to contend against so great a host of strong and wounded feelings.
Next to the love of gaming, which we observe among the inhabitants of
this place, may be classed their fondness for dress and dancing. In
foppery, the young and the aged of St. Domingo imitate their brethren of
Paris. At Port au Prince they have a public place of amusement, termed
Vauxhall; where they assemble in as great crowds as at the
gaming-houses, and notwithstanding the heat of climate, they often dance
throughout the night. The mixed assemblage, seen at this place of
evening resort, is sometimes highly ludicrous. Frivolity and conceit
here prevail in their most conspicuous colours. The women appear in a
strange variety of glaring and fantastic apparel; which, intermixed with
the different costumes of the military, and the whimsical dresses of the
other inhabitants, gives a most gay and tawdry appearance to the group.
Officers in splendid uniforms, exhibiting all the airs of full-bred
petits-maitres, are seen tripping about with high turbaned belles in
gaudy many-coloured dresses; while others of the men appear in long
surtouts, or cotton coats, hanging down to their heels: some pretty
youths are laced up like mummies; others, affecting the fierce warrior,
tread the mazy dance in heavy boots and spurs, occasionally with their
sabres at their sides, and not unfrequently without taking off their
hats. The trifling airs, and apish tricks of the greater part of them,
are calculated to excite only sentiments of ridicule: but an Englishman
cannot behold a robust hussar figuring up and down in weighty boots and
spurs, bearing a ponderous sabre in one hand, with a small fan to cool
his gentle person in the other, and playing off all the insignificancy
of a fop, without feeling a glow of indignation and disgust.