March 9, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



379 



Dr. James Carroll said in discussing 

 Dr. Kohnke's paper: "The chart by 

 which Dr. Kohnke shows that there was 

 a marked increase in the death rates from 

 pernicious malaria and acute nephritis in 

 New Orleans during the months of May 

 and June, 1905, proves conclusively to my 

 mind that fatal cases of yellow fever oc- 

 curred in the city during those months and 

 that the disease was probably also present 

 during the month of April. They recall 

 forcibly to my mind an incident that oc- 

 curred at Pinar del Rio, Cuba, in 1900. 

 During a localized outbreak of yellow fever 

 a number of deaths took place and though 

 some post mortem examinations were made 

 the cases were diagnosed 'pernicious ma- 

 laria with acute nephritis.' The unusual 

 mortality rate attracted attention and upon 

 investigation it was found that the disease 

 prevailing was yellow fever. As the 

 records of innumerable epidemics show 

 that where yellow fever is wrongly diag- 

 nosed it is usually regarded as pernicious 

 malarial or bilious remittent fever, and as 

 death from yellow fever is usually accom- 

 panied by acute nephritis or parenchyma- 

 tous degeneration of the kidneys, the ex- 

 planation suggested is probably the correct 

 one. This opinion is borne out by the 

 record for July and the following months 

 during which the excessive number of 

 deaths from pernicious malaria and acute 

 nephritis no longer appears, seemingly for 

 the reason that yellow fever was declared 

 in the month of July." 



The Practical Side of Mosquito Extermi- 

 nation: Henry Clay Weeks. (Pre- 

 sented by A. C. Eustis.) 

 In essaying to speak on such a theme be- 

 fore a body of scientists, it must not be 

 understood that the purely scientific side 

 is to be subordinated or is imagined to be 

 of less importance than the practical. On 

 the reverse, the methods under which prac- 



tical work has been most successful are 

 based entirely on the scientific work of the 

 entomologists. It is through their patient 

 labor that others have been encouraged to 

 carry into practise their findings to their 

 legitimate results. The scientific work of 

 the bacteriologists too has given great 

 strength to the demand for practical work. 



Without diminishing their share in the 

 movement it may be truly said, however, 

 that entomologists have always known the 

 fact that the mosquito must have water in 

 which to develop from the larval and pupal 

 stages to the adult. But, as is very gen- 

 erally the case, these students have been, 

 in former years at least, engrossed with the 

 study of the life, habits and structure of 

 these pests and did not carry, and indeed 

 were formerly hardly expected to carry, 

 the knowledge gained into the practical 

 realms of extermination. They may be 

 said to have been working at too close a 

 range to see all the results which their 

 knowledge implied. There was needed the 

 more general survey over the entire sub- 

 ject by practical minds of persons, who 

 knew, perhaps, only the basal facts about 

 these pests, to bring about a great reform. 

 Just as in the case of some one who con- 

 fines his attention closely to his line of 

 business, another in a different line will see 

 opportunities of extension and profit which 

 his closeness of application precludes. 

 Thus there has grown up a profession of 

 men who go from one business house to 

 another more thoroughly practicalizing 

 businesses of which they before knew little 

 or nothing. 



In this case, exceptionally, the suggestion 

 of relief came from Dr. L. 0. Howard, who 

 combined both the student and the prac- 

 tical mind, and by his experiments and an- 

 nouncements brought hope that practical 

 extermination on a wide scale was possible. 

 And when Dr. Howard saw that there was 



