WORK ON STATEN ISLAND 445 



ence of adult Anopheles, glass tubes fitted with cotton plugs were distributed 

 among the occupants of these houses with the request that the mosquitoes found 

 in the house at night be captured and placed in the tubes. In the collections 

 were found many Anopheles. These were particularly numerous in tubes com* 

 ing from a small group of houses. In one of the latter was found a family con- 

 sisting of five persons all of whom showed the acute or chronic form of malaria. 

 Doctor Doty himself secured live mosquitoes from the interior of this house. 

 On the first evening five were captured, and all but one were Anopheles. On the 

 second evening twenty-two were collected, and of these more than one-half were 

 Anopheles. In a house on the opposite comer was found a patient suffering 

 from an acute attack of malaria. 



In the beginning considerable difficulty was found in detecting the breeding- 

 places of the Anopheles, but this became easier as the inspections became more 

 thorough. For instance, in a group of two or three houses close together a num- 

 ber of Anopheles were captured, but their breeding-place could not be found for 

 some time. Finally in the back yard of one of the houses, overgrown with weeds, 

 was discovered a large metal receptacle with numerous Anopheles larvse and 

 with many adults in the immediate vicinity. This receptacle was almost en- 

 tirely covered by underbrush. After this experience, the men employed learned 

 to make the closest possible search. 



The island was then divided into small districts which were visited by a mos- 

 quito corps consisting of five men, one of whom was a sanitary poKce officer con- 

 nected with the New York City Department of Health. The equipment of the 

 mosquito corps consisted of a large wagon provided with spades, rakes, hose, 

 scythes and petroleum oil. A house to house inspection was made in each dis- 

 trict. House owners or tenants were required to remove from about the premises 

 all receptacles which might act as breeding-places, or to protect them. Eain- 

 water barrels and cisterns were covered with wire netting, all roof gutters were 

 repaired, and pools of water were covered with petroleum. In certain instances 

 orders were sent to the owners of property containing depressions in the soil to 

 fill these in or drain them. If these orders could not be enforced, the mosquito 

 corps returned every ten days or two weeks and applied more petroleum. Copies 

 of a circular of information were delivered so far as possible to each house on 

 Staten Island by police officers, and this educational campaign brought about 

 valuable cooperation on the part of the public. 



In 1905 the details of this work were presented to the Department of Health 

 of the city of New York, and the city government granted an appropriation for 

 the drainage of the swamp land along the entire coast of the island. With the 

 aid of this appropriation, ditching was carried on somewhat in the same manner 

 in which it has been carried on in New Jersey. Down to the present time, 

 between eight hundred and one thousand miles of ditches have been dug. The 

 swarms of mosquitoes soon practically disappeared, window screens were dis- 

 carded, and meals were served upon the verandas of the hotels. 



With the malarial and other inland mosquitoes, the work was carried on in 

 the manner above described, not only in the built-up portion of the island, but 



