My duties. I struggle with the greatest care, and with the object of keeping myself fit for work, but in spite of this, I find myself growing more and more unfit for work. The only time in the day that I am able during the hot months to do any work at all that requires thought or attention is in the very early morning. I commence usually about 5, and when there is anything specially important to do, I begin earlier. After 8 or 9, my hand becomes oppressed, and during office hours, I manage to get through my current business only slowly and with the utmost difficulty, taking three or four times longer than would suffice to do it well if I were in normal condition. After office, I am so exhausted as to be quite incapable of any effort. These symptoms of disability increase the longer I stay in Hongkong – they are much more marked this hot season than last. And I feel that if I remained here, I should soon become altogether unable to discharge my duties at all.
The climate has also seriously affected my hearing and eyesight. I am growing decidedly deaf, and not only has my eyesight sensibly weakened, but I am frequently unable in the office to read, and have in consequence often to sit doing nothing at all for a while, sometimes for more than half an hour at a time.
I have not the slightest doubt that these symptoms are produced exclusively by the extreme damp and oppressiveness that characterize the Hongkong climate, and that they would disappear if I were in a place where the damp is less excessive; for mere heat, of which I have experienced a good deal during my service, has never affected me similarly. It is the combination of extreme damp with heat that has produced these results. I am organically sound so far (barring a slight weakness of heart), which confirms...
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