Rice is one of the most nutritive and salubrious of the farinaceous aliments, and certainly does not operate to render the humours acrid, and thereby to inflame the eyes. It is used as a main article of food by the natives of a large portion of Asia, and forms no inconsiderable part of the consumption in other countries, without being observed to produce any such effect as is here attributed to it; and may therefore fairly be denied to have any such power. Something more plausible indeed offers itself as to the injurious operation of an external cause. Nothing can be more subtle than the dust into which the vegetable soil of Egypt resolves itself when it becomes dry. This, during a certain portion of the year, is in a manner suspended in the air, from a cause which exists in few other countries, I mean the want of rain. It also contains a large portion of nitre, which is copiously produced in Egypt. This circumstance, however, is common to many other places. This light dust, doubtless of a very irritating quality, not only floats in the streets, but pervades the apartments of every dwelling, insinuating itself into the most artfully constructed inclosures: by it therefore the eyes may and must be in some degree affected. But Nature has not ordained that a part so much exposed should be destitute of its appropriate protection. The secretions of the lachrymal glands are, in general, abundantly sufficient to counteract the injury sustained by the action of corrosive or irritating substances on the external fabric of the eye, being always produced exactly in proportion to the circumstances that demand them, as daily experience confirms: yet it cannot be denied, that the continually repeated operation of an offending cause, when no remedy is applied, may be more than commensurate with the efforts of Nature to restore herself. Such is precisely the condition of the Kahirines. The accommodating the quality of diet to the symptoms of derangement in the economy is a precaution unknown to them: and of their remedies, many are so prepared, or so administered, as to augment rather than to annihilate disease. No idea offers itself to them, but of topical applications to remove a local complaint. If any thing be applied in these _flussioni_ (dysophthalmia) it is generally _kôhhel_ (calx of tin mixed with sheep’s fat) or _tûtti_, a still more powerful astringent, applied in coarse powder, and naturally tending to increase rather than to allay the irritation.