66 HOME LIFE IN FLORIDA. 



were improperly made or allowed to become uncleanly, 

 the malaria fiend grew and flourished, and performed its 

 deadly work unsuspected, while in the humbler homes 

 these breeding places were missing. 



It was also found that experiments on the air from differ- 

 ent places, but all of them ''country air," gave different 

 results. Sometimes the same methods used for the de- 

 struction of the germs failed to have that effect. This was 

 the case with the air of Florida, taken from various local- 

 ities away from the low or swampy lands or along the low 

 margins of lakes or rivers. Why? Because the germs 

 were not there to be killed ; because the air was absolutely 

 pure, in its deepest and widest sense. 



In the low hammocks or wherever decaying vegetation 

 lay on the surface of the ground, there, as must be ex- 

 pected, the malaria fiend was discovered, ' ' seeking whom 

 he might devour," stronger in summer than in winter, but 

 seldom, as we have seen, as powerful here for evil as in 

 other similar localities, because of the lack of excess of 

 moisture to feed upon. 



But in the undulating lands, or even in the flat woods, 

 where the soil is sandy and the tall pine tree towers aloft, 

 as it does on more than three fourths of the land surface 

 of the State, where the lakes have clear, sandy shores, 

 there the malaria fiend meets his death the moment he 

 seeks to enter the charmed circle. 



One of the most important factors both in producing 

 and in preserving the remarkable purity of the Florida 

 atmosphere is her much-abused '' sandy soil," which has so 

 often been held triumphantly aloft by her enemies, to be 

 pointed at in ridicule, as an evidence of the falsity of her 

 claims to luxurious vegetable production. 



For the character of the soil has a very great influence 

 on the health or otherwise of those who dwell upon it, and 



