WHOLE VOL. APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY HOWARD 493 



parasitic organisms could be destroyed in the humans there would be 

 no malaria for the Anopheles to carry. So the price of quinine was 

 not only greatly reduced by the State, but it was given without price 

 to the indigent, and it was coated with sugared chocolate to make it 

 attractive tO' small children. Of course the mosquitoes still bit them, 

 but they were for the most part uninfected. 



I asked Celli whether it would not be much simpler to fight the 

 mosc[uito population by the drainage or treatment of breeding places, 

 as we did in America. He replied that they had not the financial 

 means to undertake such measures on a large scale and that the 

 character of the soil was such as to make proper drainage practically 

 impossible. As a matter of fact, of course, both the Romans and the 

 Etruscans, as Celli had shown in his admirable book on malaria, had 

 carried on extensive drainage operations on the Campagna, but these 

 did not go far enough to obliterate the many collections of water in 

 which mosquitoes breed. I noticed that they were breeding freely in 

 the ditches. 



Then too, of course, large-scale operations on the Campagna would 

 have been hampered by the prevalence of the absentee ownership of 

 the greater part of the country, the owners not only being absent but 

 apparently for the most part indififerent as to the health of the 

 peasants. 



For example, in 1923 I went by automobile with Grassi from Rome 

 to Fiumacino where he had been working for a long time with the 

 help of a very able assistant, Signor Negri, on the problem of malaria 

 reduction. On the property that we visited there were large and 

 apparently useless lakes, the grass-grown margins of which afforded 

 perfect protection to Anopheles larvae. Grassi had introduced fish, 

 and talked to me about the possible use of Paris green which had at 

 that time just come into prominence as the result of the work of 

 Roubaud of France and Barber and Hayne of the United States, and 

 also of W. V. King. Of course, I at once asked him why the useless 

 lakes were not drained ; and he replied that the absentee owner would 

 not go to the expense. 



It was on this trip that Grassi showed me the interesting mating of 

 Anopheles at nightfall about certain pigsties on the estate. He had 

 been the first person to observe this mating, in spite of the efforts of 

 many men in many countries for many years. 



Grassi's work, especially in this region, had been systematic, and 

 he showed me a mass of records that had accumulated and which 

 undoubtedly contained many facts of value. Flis especial interest in 

 this region continued until the time of his death. Since 1924, the 



