^;44 



THE XATIUXAL G]-:(:)('-RAl'l IIC ^lAGAZIXE 



stro3-s, but imlividual screecli-owls are 

 often (lfsti"ucti\e to bird life. 



Crows and ja)'S will bear watching. 

 There seem to be good crows and ja)'s, 

 and then again individtials among them 

 of exceeding bad habits, as many a long- 

 sutlering bird famih' knows to its sorrow. 



In man}' places the Jinglish sparrows 

 are pests and should Ije shot and trapped 

 relentlessly. They are pretty canny 

 birds, and if once the\' learn ^■ou are af- 

 ter them \\ illi a gun they quickl}' desert 



the premises. If owmg to surroundmg 

 conditions gunning for them seems un- 

 desu-able, traps may be used with telling 

 effect. There are se\eral kinds in use in 

 tliis coimtry. 



Last, but not least, the black snake 

 should be killed w hene\er found : its 

 large size, great acti\"it3% tree-climbing 

 ])ropensities, and taste for eggs and small 

 ))irds ha\e fairly won for it the reputa- 

 tion of being one of the birds' deadliest 

 enemies. 



REDEEMING THE TROPICS 



By William Jc)sj;ph Showalter 



Autlior of " /Uiftliiit/ icifli flic raiiaiiia Slides," "The Countries of the Caribbean, 

 "The Panama Canal," in the Xational Ceograpliic ^h^ga.zille 



IN THESE days wdien medical science 

 has been recording one triumph after 

 an( ither over germ-produced diseases, 

 wdien the germ-hunter in his laboratory 

 has been ascertaining the cattses of so 

 man\' nnsterious afflictions and laving the 

 foundations for one preventive measure 

 after another, pei iple all but lose sight of 

 the tremendous debt humanity owes to 

 the expert in ex])erimental medicine and 

 the sanitarian. Indeed, he would be a 

 prescient mathematician wdio could calcu- 

 late what the vast amount of this debt is. 

 It is onlv when we look back over the 

 records c>f the past, wdien civilization was 

 yoitng and humanitjr without knowledge 

 of the causes of the great epidemic dis- 

 eases, that ^\•e can have a faint appreci- 

 ation of what the patient man of the 

 microscope has wrought in humanity's 

 behalf. 



"When we see X'ajjles, in the seven- 

 teenth century, as helpless as a new-born 

 bal)e in the grip of a plague during wdiich 

 380,000 souls perished in si.x months ; 

 when we see Constantinople, in 1812, wdth 

 144,000 deaths; when we see London, in 

 the da)s of the great plague, with 70,000 

 of its ]iopulation carried ofT ; wdien we go 

 back to China and behold a few short 

 years in the fourteenth centur\' with a 

 "black death" luortalit}' record of 13 mil- 

 lion souls, and to Europe, in the great 



scourge of 1347-1350, and see 25 million 

 people dying; when we come on lEwn 

 the years and see the unt(.ild millions who 

 have died from the numerous pestilences 

 \\ hich have inflicted death tipon mankind ; 

 then, and not till then, can we begin to 

 appreciate wdiat it all means. 



Even then our appraisal will fall far 

 short of the truth, for in those times the 

 \\'orld was, in a sense, larger, the seas 

 ^\•ere broader, and the distances on land 

 much greater than in these d'dvs of highly 

 de\eloped transportation and commerce. 

 How can the mind conceive of the terri- 

 Ide toll epidemic diseases would take to- 

 day, with our world-wide commerce, 

 with our metropolitan and cosmopolitan 

 cities, and with the constant commingling 

 of the peoples of all lands, were it not 

 for pre\-entive measures? 



M.\I'-CII.\XGIXG ilKDlCIXE 



Thniugbout the history of the ages one 

 may read of great changes in the maps 

 of the earth that have resulted on the one 

 hand from the ra\-ages of disease and 

 on the other fr(->m the disco\er_\- of meth- 

 ods of Combatting it. 



We see the ".glory that was Greece" 

 depart because of the terrible toll exacted 

 b>- nialaria ; we see a Panama Canal made 

 possible because of the knowledge of the 

 causation of yellow fever that came to 



