HEALTH IS CREDIT 107 



cost of the upkeep of the work will diminish. But 

 in the meantime the town will progress, its financial 

 position will improve, for its credit will become 

 cheaper and greater. Ultimately its population will 

 increase because a falling death-rate, progress, and 

 the improving credit will attract immigration, and 

 then the rate of sixpence per head per year will fall 

 until perhaps a penny will be sufficient. At Port 

 Said during the first year of the mosquito campaign 

 41,120 gallons of petroleum were used, but during the 

 second year only 31,670 gallons were required. In 

 that town, also, the campaign cost 1,176 the first 

 year (1907), and this sum fell to 1,023 in the second 

 year. Now (1910) the annual cost is only 800, and 

 the population of the town is increasing rapidly. 

 Lastly, the improving credit of the place must have 

 repaid the capital buried more than once already. 

 Other towns, Ismailia, Havana, Rio, New Orleans, 

 Klang, Santos, Colon, Panama, etc., tell the same 

 story. So if the work has been well performed, and 

 successfully carried out and maintained, the pro- 

 fessional grumbler will soon be gagged by the weight 

 of public opinion. 



It is as well, however, to curtail, as far as possible, 

 all unnecessary expenditure. See that the workmen 

 do not waste oil. One lazy man may pour all his 

 allowance of oil into one cesspool, and then rest in 

 a cafe for the remainder of the day. If he does this, 

 the mosquitos will reappear in the neglected houses, 

 and complaints will soon come in. As his name is 

 written on the door of these houses, he will soon be 



