er has
wisely and wittily pointed out to certain amateur statisticians who
would fain reduce the mortality of Munich by leaving out of view the
immense percentage of infant deaths.

The evil effects of the harsh air are increased by the clouds of dust
which the wind is continually raising in the broad graveled
streets--dust the more irritating to eyes, nose and lungs because
largely composed of lime, and which dries with marvelous rapidity
after the frequent heavy showers and protracted rains for which this
region is also remarkable. It is the last resort of the citizens of
Munich, when driven out of every other defence of their climate, to
say, "But it is a good climate for the nerves." One would like to know
for _what_ nerves and _whose_ nerves, since strangers who reside here
for any length of time generally find that any constitutional tendency
to ailments in which the nerves are principally involved is increased,
instead of lessened; and among the natives themselves brain diseases,
strokes of all kinds, fits and cramps, are frequent and fatal, while
the enemy which they fear the most, and which presses them the
hardest, is known by them as "nervous fever," The air is too
stimulating for any but the most robust constitutions; and the sudden
blasts of fierce wind that continually interrupt the enjoyment of even
the few days of otherwise pleasant weather, and the intolerable glare
of the sun upon the dusty streets and squares and monotonous rows, of
light-colored houses, unrelieved, for the most part, by trees or vines
or any green thing, are perpetual irritants which must react
unfavorably upon the general health. Indeed, one begins at last to
find in the harshness of the climate some explanation, if not excuse,
for the roughness of disposition and manner which have made the people
of Munich a proverb among their countrymen and a terror to foreign
residents.

Another cause of the unhealthiness of Munich is the nature of the
soil. The ground upon which the city is built, as also the land for a
considerable distance round about, was formerly the bed of a lake, and
consists of a loose gravel to the depth of many feet, there being
scarcely enough earth upon the top to furnish subsistence for the
commonest grass and weeds, while trees, esculent vegetables and
flowers can only be raised by preparing a new soil, which must be
continually enriched by artificial means. A proverb says, "Scratch a
Russian and the Tartar show