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AUDY & HARRISON 
mostly in collaboration with other workers, but these are not considered in detail in the present 
paper : several collections are briefly described below. The bulk of the routine animal collection 
is made up of rodents and insectivores, rodents contributing about 85 per cent, and insectivores 
a little over 5 per cent. The collection represents some 115 species of mammals, about 30 
species of birds, and about 90 species of reptiles and amphibians. 
In addition to the above routine collection, parasites are collected from “ mark-release ’ ’ 
experiments ( see below) and also trombiculids from the ears of rats (totalling some 2800 pairs) 
which were regularly sent from Singapore and Klang during 1948-1951. A similar collection 
from the ears of 40 rats was also sent from Hong Kong (1949-1950) by Mr J. D. Romer. 
Nymphal and adult stages are also collected in the field. The parasites are generally mounted 
in a polyvinyl alcohol medium (PVA), the recognisable species identified, and series set aside 
for study. Many photographs of animals, photomicrographs of mites, and drawings have 
been made. 
A valuable collection of trombiculid mites and a few mammal hosts from various parts of 
India has been sent by Lt-Colonel S. Lai Kalra, formerly Pathologist in charge of the G.H.Q. 
(India) Field Typhus Research Detachment attached to the joint laboratory at Imphal, and now 
at the Armed Services Medical College, Poona. Most of Kalra’s new species of mites have been 
described by Womersley (1952). Dr. Carl Gibson-Hill of the Raffles Museum, Singapore, 
made a collection on behalf of the Unit in the Nicobar Islands in 1950. Another valuable 
collection of over 700 hosts and their parasites was made in Sarawak between May 1950 and 
January, 1952, in collaboration with Mr. Tom Harrisson, Government Ethnologist and Curator 
of the Sarawak Museum, Kuching, and also with Traub. Two collections from 944 animals 
were made in North Borneo jointly by the U.S. Army Research Unit (led by Traub) and the 
Colonial Office Research Unit in 1951 and 1952. A major collection from Thailand was made 
by Mr. Robert Elbel of the Plague Control Section of the U.S. Special Medical and Economic 
Mission to Thailand. By the courtesy of our colleague Traub, a part of this collection is being 
studied jointly. These collections from India, the island of Borneo, and Thailand will be made 
the subject of other papers by various authors. Some of the findings have been provisionally 
summarised in a following paper (Audy 1953a, this Study p 30). 
We particularly wish to record our advantageous association with the several U.S. Army 
Medical Research Units which have visited Malaya. Directed by Dr. Joseph E. Smadel and, 
except for the first team, led by Lt-Colonel Robert Traub, these teams have represented the 
U.S. Army Research and Graduate School at Washington, D.C., and the Commission on 
Immunisation of the Armed Forces Epidemiological Board. There were four visits of several 
months each by these research teams between 1948 and 1951. This collaboration is expected to 
continue. While working at the Institute, Traub and his colleagues have made many collections 
of hosts and parasites, independently or jointly with the Colonial Office Unit. At all times the 
exchange of material and information between the two units has been complete and we are 
greatly indebted to our American colleagues, and in particular to Lt-Colonel Traub and 
Dr. Smadel, for their many courtesies and their hearty collaboration. 
A General Account of the Country 
Malaya lies between i° and 7 0 north of the equator and contains mountains up to 2,000m, 
low hilly terrain, and plains in roughly equal proportions. It appears originally to have been 
covered entirely by Tropical Rain Forest in which from very early times the aboriginal pigmy 
tribes have practised shifting cultivation in clearings. Possibly for some thousands of years the 
major river valleys and coastal areas, especially in the west flank, have been cleared to a limited 
extent, settled, and devoted to the cultivation of such crops as rice. During the last century, 
and particularly during the last half-century, large tracts have been cleared of forest and either 
STUD. INST. MED. RES. 
