124 



Insects and Disease 



tion for the insight, the energy, the skill, the courage, 

 and withal the modesty and simplicity of the leader 

 of that remarkable band of workers. If any man de- 

 served a monument to his memory, it was Reed. If 

 any band of men deserve recognition at the hands of 

 their countrymen, it is Reed's colleagues." 



Their first work was to determine whether any 

 of the germs that had been claimed to be the 

 cause of yellow fever were really responsible for 

 the disease. Bacillus icteroides that for some time 

 and by some investigators had been named as the 

 offender was particularly investigated, but was 

 proved to be a secondary invader only. 



Dr. Charles Finlay of Havana had been claiming 

 for some years that the yellow fever was trans- 

 mitted by means of the mosquito and possibly by 

 other insects also. He even claimed to have proved 

 this theory experimentally. We know now, how- 

 ever, that there must have been errors in his ex- 

 periments and that his patients became infected 

 from sources other than those he was dealing with. 



The Yellow Fever Commission decided to put 

 this theory to the test and secured a number of 

 volunteers for the experiments. The first thing 

 was to let an infected mosquito bite some non- 

 immune person. How this was done and the re- 

 sults, may be told in Dr. Carroll's own words. 



