The record-union., 1899-08-20

the Colorado, Utah, and Pennsylvania
commands came home in even better
physical condition than the Oregons.
The "Oregonian" says upon this sub
ject:
The fine appearance of our returned
Oregon volunteers: the list of their
death roll, testify that the climate of
Luzon did not Drove as fatal to our
White soldiers as the first year of cam
paigning in Virginia and Tennessee did
to the Union volunteers of 1861-62. Now
science comes forward to prove by the
record that tropical climates do not
prove fatal to the white man If the
white man behaves himself with sobri-
ETY., lives cleanly and adjusts his diet
and his daily exercise to the situation
just as a Southern planter does in Lou
isiana, Mississippi or Alabama during
hot weather.
DR.. William z. Ripley, in his recent
published work, THE Races Of Europe"
points out that the question of accli-
matization must be kept carefully dis
tinguished from such disturbing factors
as alcoholism and other excesses and
national habits in respect of food, and
he shows that there is no proof that
white settlers in the tropics are afflicted
with sterility: that is, they do not
when they conform to local necessities
of diet and abstinence from alcoholic
excesses, become degenerate.
The Dutch have accommodated them
selves to the tropical conditions of
South Africa, of Java and Sumatra, and
IN 1a xxrhU with
proper dietetic and sanitary precau-
tions, Americans should not be able to
adapt themselves to the Philippines.
The old-time mortality resulting from
diseases of the liver among English sol
diers of India is attributed by DR.. Rip
ley more to the excessive consumption
of alcoholic drinks than to the infiu-
ence of the climate, for the wives ana
children of these soldiers exhibited
compare tive immunity from disorders
of the liver.
The mortality that formerly prevailed
among English troops in the tropics
was due largely to their persistent use
Of meat when the habits of the natives
taught them to be content with less
meat and more cereals and lighter food.
The Chinese accommodate themselves
easily to a tropical climate because OF
their simple diet of rice. The Jews seem
to thrive in all climates because OF their
wise cosmopolitan adaptation of their
diet and habits to the climate. Science
comedies, according to DR.. Ripley, that
with the exception of Cochin-C China and
the west coast of Africa, white men
have fair chance of good health in the
tropics. Heat by itself, unaccompanied
by excessive humidity, does not seri-
ously affect human health except when
unduly prolonged. The birth rate of the
French colonists in Algeria exceeds that
of France itself, and the death rate is
hardly above the normal. In Tunis, the
birth rate of white settlers was nearly
third greater in 1S90-92 than the death
rate From the harmful combination
of high temperature and moisture, re-
lief is found in those tropical islands,
like Porto Rico and the Philippines.
when the alternating sea and land
breezes temper and alleviate the tropl-
cal climate to the sensibilities of a
white man. Luzon is a mount
ainous. volcanic island, distant from the
equator some thirteen to nineteen de-
grees, and it is beyond a reasonable
question that Americans should be able
to accommodate themselves to its eli
mate better than the Dutch have adapt
ed themselves to Java.