Fowls are reckoned to be infinitely _cooler_ in their temperament than sheep or oxen, and their flesh is also considered as very safe and cooling; hence the almost universal use of the former, and prohibition or disuse of the latter, in the dietary of a delicate invalid. This distinction will appear still more strongly marked, when it is observed, that to prescribe beef-tea in any acute disease would be deemed an act of rashness and ignorance; but chicken-tea is held to be the most cooling of diluents, and very eligible in the most inflammatory diseases and in the warmest weather. This chicken-tea, called “agua de pollo,” is commonly prepared in the proportions of three cupsfull of water to one half of a little unfledged chicken, with the addition of a mallow leaf or two, and the core of a lettuce, (cogollo de lechuga,) by which latter in particular its cooling properties are said to be exalted. After the ingredients are boiled together for a proper length of time, the clear decoction is poured off for use. The great efficacy of this drink is accredited by the undisputed consent of doctors of all colours, and matrons as well as nurses of all sorts and temperaments. It is needless to remark that, in general, plain water or toast-water, or a ptisan of barley decocted with some of the subacid fruits of the country, would answer very agreeably the purpose of the agua de pollo; but when the latter is preferred, it should be remembered that in warm weather it decomposes rapidly, and then acquires irritating properties. As a purgative, in gastric disorders, the old physicians in Lima extol almond oil, which is often of inferior quality; and they take some pains to arm the minds of the credulous against the use of the best castor-oil of European preparation, by telling them that it is extracted from the seeds of the “higuerilla,” or castor-oil shrub, everywhere indigenous in the warm valleys of the interior; and these seeds are generally known to be excessively drastic when taken as the peasants use them, in the dose of two or three bruised, and then swallowed in substance. Now from the seeds the native apothecaries prepare an impure oil, which is sold in the shops under the name of “oil of higuerilla;” and as it is only used for burning in lamps, when the vulgar learn that castor-oil is but another name for the same, they naturally consider it as essentially hot, and most heating and improper for internal use. The vulgar should be advised by every ingenuous and intelligent member of the profession, that the fault is not in the remedy, but in the way of preparing it: and this remark may be extended to the delicate preparations from the mineral kingdom, which acquire a bad name when badly prepared, as is necessarily the case in Lima, where chemistry is so little cultivated or practised as a science.