The difference thus marked in the state of the air appears to influence very materially the character of several diseases, as intermittent fevers or _tercianas_, which on the northern coast of Peru, or what is called _costa de abajo_, and more particularly in the eminently dry province of Piura, are of milder type than along the shores of the southern and maritime departments of Peru, known under the name of _los intermedios_. The Indian population of Piura are a hardy and healthy race of people, naturally inclined to corpulency; and, indeed, the Indians of Peru in general are constitutionally disposed to a sleek rotundity of form, which it would only require ease and good generous diet to call into full developement, so as to render the bulk of this race _as fat as Caciques_. Most of the chronic diseases of the Piuranos are said to result from leaving all to nature in the earlier stages of their complaints; and, among these northern provincialists, phthisis, dysentery, tercianas or agues, and typhus mitior,[32] are endemic. The same sort of complaints, varying however in the intensity of attendant symptoms, are met with all along the maritime valleys of the coast; and in the list of prevalent diseases at Lima and elsewhere, visceral obstructions, intestinal hæmorrhage, disorders of the heart, and asthma, deserve particular notice. There are also a variety of cutaneous eruptions and nervous diseases of frequent occurrence, upon the nature and cure of which it is not at present our purpose to enlarge. In consumption, which, in all its various forms, is a common disease on the coast of Peru, a portion of the lungs becoming by degrees ulcerated and destroyed, there is consequently an interruption to the proper discharge of the pulmonary functions, accompanied with nocturnal increase of fever and excessive perspiration. But, even in this advanced stage of the disease, changing the air of the coast for that of the mountains or temperate valleys of the Sierra, is found to produce great relief and prolongation of life. Spitting of blood from the lungs seems in most instances to depend on the presence of tubercular phthisis, or on an inherent constitutional tendency to this disease; and any accidental excitement, as that from cold or undue exposure to atmospherical vicissitudes, may hurry on cases of pulmonary hæmorrhage to a fatal termination. Suckling, in particular, is known to be apt to occasion spitting of blood, which, if not cured in time, usually ends in those symptoms which characterise consumption of the lungs.