( 59 ) 
the interior may be rapidly transported to the coast. To the increased develop- 
ment of trade is probably due the outbreaks of fever at certain of the fruit ports, 
and its extension into the interior of Guatemala and Spanish Honduras, in the 
present year. 
The fruit ports of Nicaragua and Costa Rica remained free this summer, 
but Yellow fever was present in the interior of Nicaragua and at Bocas del loro. 
Finally in Panama, like in Mexico, Yellow fever is endemic. Here there 
is an immense engineering enterprise under way, and already the United States 
Panama Canal Commission has over 9,000 employes on the Isthmus. The 
world is looking' on with confidence to the United States Isthmus Commission 
being able to control and prevent the spread of Yellow fever in the canal zone. 
At present, however, there are cases of Yellow lever, and more recently plague 
has been announced. Thus on the northern and southern extremities of Central 
America, in the Republics in which most works of construction are being under- 
taken, Yellow fever is present and plague has occurred. 
British Honduras differs from the surrounding Republics ; it is as yet 
undeveloped, its only means of communication in the interior are the natural 
waterways ; there are no roads and no railroads. Its commerce is concen- 
trated on the coast at the mouths of the rivers. Its liability to infection is 
not from its land side, but comes through its coast towns with which, and 
the adjacent Republics, there is considerable trade in English goods ; Belize 
being the centre for the distribution of English goods in Central America. 
MEXICO. 
Commercial expansion in Mexico has been greatly hindered by the 
presence of Yellow fever and the dread of epidemics. From 1878 to 1898 
Tampico was free and its progress was correspondingly rapid ; a set back 
occurred in 1898, and again in May of 1903, when a large number of people 
migrated and labour became exceedingly scarce. 
In the same way Progreso, in Yucatan, nearer the British territory, which 
on account of its proximity to Cuba was expected to have a large trade with 
that Island and indirectly with the United States, was likewise thrown back 
through the fear of an epidemic. At Vera Cruz, with a population of 38,000, 
records from 1866 show that there has been an almost unbroken annual 
death rate from Yellow fever, as the following table shows 
From the Yellow Fever Report, 1903, of the United States Marine Hospital Service. 
Year. 
Deaths. 
Year. 
Deaths. 
Year. 
Deaths. 
Year. 
Deaths. 
1866 
264 
1876 
34 
1886 
208 
1896 
O 
1867 
33 2 
1877 
528 
1887 
4 
1897 
2 
1868 
187 
1878 
448 
1888 
3 
1898 
127 
1869 
IO 
1879 
21 
1889 
2 
1899 
670 
1870 
I I 
1880 
254 
1890 
40 
1900 
259 
1871 
271 
1881 
723 
1891 
180 
1901 
102 
1872 
215 
1882 
72 
1892 
259 
1902 
1873 
322 
1883 
747 
1893 
131 
1903 
1874 
79 
I 884 
136 
1894 
209 
1904 
1875 
425 
1885 
328 
1895 
143 
1905 
* I find it very difficult to obtain precise figures for these dates in 1903, the total number of cases 
appears very high, i . e ., over 1,000 ; with the advent of sound prophylactic measures the number ol 
cases drop, and in 1904 some 76 cases are recorded, and 17 (?) in 1905. 
8 a 
