478 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 84 



This was due probably to Surgeon General Gorgas' confidence in his 

 ability to control mosquito breeding, based upon his successful work 

 in Habana and the Panama Canal. 



Entomology links up in a way with another medical matter of 

 great importance. Early in the century, the danger in the use of 

 bisulphide of carbon as a fumigant for stored grain to kill grain wee- 

 vils of different kinds became so very apparent that it attracted the 

 earnest attention of the fire insurance companies. The Bureau of 

 Entomology, therefore, tried to get an efficient substitute which lacked 

 this danger. Carbon tetrachlorid had been mentioned at that time in 

 connection with fire-extinguisher work, and experiments were under- 

 taken by F. H. Chittenden and C. EI. Popenoe of the Bureau with 

 the use of this substance against grain insects; and in 191 1 a bulle- 

 tin was published (Bureau of Entomology No. 96, Part 4), under 

 the authorship of Chittenden and Popenoe, in which the results of 

 their experiments were shown to have justified the use of this chemi- 

 cal in small compartments, although its expense would hardly justify 

 its use in large buildings such as warehouses and mills. 



Later, Dr. Maurice C. Hall, of the Bureau of Animal Industry, 

 used carbon tetrachlorid with effect against intestinal worms in ani- 

 mals, and this chemical has since been used with admirable results 

 against the hookworm in human beings. It is more effective than the 

 old thymol and chenopodium and is infinitely more agreeable as a 

 dose. It has been used on mass populations in several tropical coun- 

 tries, notably perhaps in Eiji. Dr. S. M. Lambert, in the Journal 

 of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (May 15, 1928), says of Hall's 

 discovery, " I reckon this as the greatest contribution to tropical medi- 

 cine after the work of Ross on malaria and the work of Reed et al. 

 and Gorgas on yellow fever." 



Thus the entomologists were indirectly concerned in another great 

 contribution to human health. 



From the rather raml)ling way in which we have treated medical 

 entomology in this section, it is perfectly evident that the section is 

 not to be considered as a definite history of medical entomology, but 

 rather as a somewhat lengthy contribution to such a history. As 

 previously stated, I have already published a jiaper entitled "A Fifty- 

 Year Sketch History of Medical Entomology " which appeared in "A 

 Half Century of Public Health — Jubilee Historical Volume of the 

 American Public Health Association" (New York, 1921), pages 

 412-438. This was reprinted by the Smithsonian Institution in its 

 y\nnual Report for 1921, pages 565-586, with ten portrait plates 



