The following observations on atmospherical vicissitudes and miasmatous matter, with the rationale of their effects in the production of disease among the inhabitants of Santiago of Chile, we have pleasure in being able to offer in the form of a translation from an essay in Spanish,[40] published in the year 1828, by Doctor William C. Blest; upon whom, though an Englishman, the Government of Chile conferred the highest professional honours, by nominating him to the protomedical chair, which he fills with credit in that republic. Dr. Blest, in endeavouring to rouse the attention of those functionaries who preside over the destinies of the republic, to the neglected state of its municipal police, says of Santiago that “The streets, with a few exceptions, have either very bad pavement, or none at all. The canals or water-courses, (las acequias,) which, without doubt, were originally intended to refresh and purify the city, are at present receptacles of every sort of nuisance; and, not having free exit, they terminate in stagnant pools around the city, which are so many laboratories of putrefaction. The cross streets are left in so shameful a state of neglect, that it is impossible to pass along their narrow foot-paths without being shocked at every step. “The suburbs, where the poorer and more numerous class of the community reside, are so full of dirt and mud, that even on horseback it is difficult to pass through them. In almost every street there are small and confined apartments, without air or light, except that which enters at the door, and these are occupied by whole families of artisans; so that it is not uncommon to see seven or eight persons crowded together in one wretched abode, where dogs and cats add to the nuisance, and still further crowd the family group. “Such is a true picture of the police of Santiago; and, to convince the curious reader of its accuracy, we need only refer to the aqueducts which pass through the streets and houses,—to the heaps of putrid matter in the cross streets,—to the deep deposits of mire and marshes,—and to the crowded and unventilated dwellings of the poor and labouring classes.... “It is too well and generally known that at all seasons, and for days together in every week, the aqueducts which pass through the houses are so completely blocked up with the quantity of vegetable matter and dead animals collected in them, that they cannot transmit even the smallest stream of water. The subordinate or cross streets, and many of the principal ones, are not less filthy; and any stranger who visits Santiago will be inclined to believe that, of all the towns of South America, it is the dirtiest.[41]