Robeeton. — Malaria and Mosquitos. 227 



As regards Italy, an Italian writer of repute (Celli) states 

 that the activity and progress which at the present time is so 

 distinctive of northern Italy compared with the other parts 

 of that country are in a large measure due to the absence 

 of the fevers so frequent in the southern districts — the Roman 

 States and Naples. A few years ago a society in Rome, 

 having as its object the study of malaria, justified its foun- 

 dation by stating that the disease prevented the cultivation 

 of 5,000,000 acres of Italian soil, annually affected some 

 two millions of its inhabitants, and killed about fifteen 

 thousand. 



In some of the British colonies malaria has doubled the 

 cost of government. During the year 1896 28J per cent, of 

 the Government servants on the Gold Coast had their services 

 lost to the State through death or ill-health due to it. An old 

 neighbour of our own, Sir William McGregor, at one time in 

 Fiji, later Governor of New Guinea, and now of Lagos, has 

 stated that the Town of Lagos heeds only one thing to make 

 it a great commercial centre, and that one desideratum is the 

 control of malaria. 



The presence of such a scourge has naturally incited 

 attempts to prevent its occurrence. For centuries there has 

 been a continued effort in this direction. The study of the 

 disease from the point of view of those concerned with the 

 care of the public health has at times been rewarded with 

 partial success. Certain points in connection with its occur- 

 rence were early noted, more especially its prevalence in 

 marshy or swampy places. As districts became better culti- 

 vated, and so better drained, the presence of intermittent 

 fevers was less and less felt. We find that in early Roman 

 times certain parts of the country around Rome were metho- 

 dically drained by means of extensive and complicated sys- 

 tems of underground channels. These districts lost their 

 then unhealthy character and became thriving and populous. 

 Later, owing to civil war and consequent neglect of cultiva- 

 tion, the drains became obstructed and the unhealthy condi- 

 tions returned. The populations of once thriving villages and 

 farms was gradually reduced, and finally the few survivors fled 

 to a less pestilential part of the country. Their dwellings 

 now form some of the ruins of the Roman Campagna. 

 Attempts to repopulate these districts were made from time to 

 time, but were attended uniformly by failure. 



Parts of England, also of France and Germany, have 

 within comparatively modern times been very subject to 

 malaria. The drainage of low-lying lands was, no doubt, the 

 •cause of its gradual extinction, an extinction, however, not 

 entirely complete, for sporadic cases are met with now and 

 again. 



