AUTUMN NUMBER 23 
(4) Lands which offer the most in crop returns, and are 
less developed than any agricultural regions of similar extent 
in the United States. 
To show the large amount of acreage that would be included 
in the above heads I will quote from Senate Document 443, 60th 
Congress, lst session. ‘“‘There are 79,000,000 acres of swamp 
lands and lands subject ot overflow in the United States, the 
bulk of which is agricultural land of the greatest potential 
productiveness. 55,000,000 acres of this land are located within 
the Southern States, and 24,000,000 acres alone are in the lower 
Mississippi Valley. These figures do not include 150,000,000 
acres of land in the U. S. not classed as swamp land and not 
subject to overflow, but which are in need of drainage. The 
larger portion of this immense area also lies in the Southern 
States.” 
The place selected for Van Dine’s work was the Hecla Plan- 
tation, on which the town of Mound, La., is located. This plan- 
tation contains 3,500 acres of land; 1,800 acres being in culti- 
vation and 1,700 acres in swamps and timber. The farming 
is done by negro tenant families, of which there are 74. The 
crops consist principally of cotton, corn and cowpeas. 
The interference of malaria with these tenants amounted to 
970 lost days as reported to the physician plus 487 days not 
- reported. This does not include the time lost by persons wait- 
ing on the patients, and does not include the cases under 8 
years of age. To figure in the amount of time lost by waiting 
on patients gives a total of 1,842 days lost through malaria. 
The loss of this labor made an estimated loss in the crop yield 
for this plantation alone of 487 bales of cotton and 4,035 
bushels of corn. 
Mr. Thibault’s work at Scott, Arkansas, was of very similar 
nature to Mr. Van Dine’s, and the actual time loss and esti- 
mated crop loss are in approximately the same ratio, so I will 
not take up the time to review his results. 
BEETLE 
O’er folded blooms 
On swirls of musk, 
The beetle booms adown the glooms 
And bumps along the dusk. 
(James Whitcomb Riley—The Beetle.) 
