raised  to  this.  We  shall  hear  about  the  hardship  to  the  poor  nati\'e 
and  of  his  inability  to  recognise  mosquito  larvae,  his  ignorance  of 
the  evil  results  which  may  follow,  and  so  on,  but  experience  has 
shown  elsewhere  that  these  difficulties  are  not  met  with  in  practice. 
Every  native  is  familiar  with  the  ‘  wriggler '  in  water,  though  he 
may  not  be  aware  that  it  develops  into  a  mosquito,  and  when  he 
realises  that  the  presence  of  a  barrel  full  of  ‘  wrigglers  ’  in  his  yard 
entails  a  compulsory  visit  to  the  police  court,  and  the  production  of  a 
certain  sum  of  money,  we  may  rest  assured  that  they  will  disappear 
like  magic.  And  it  is  not  as  if  the  suggestion  involved  any  expense  : 
all  that  is  required  is  supervision  on  the  part  of  the  occupier,  the 
frequent  emptying  of  water  barrels  and  other  vessels,  the  dail)' 
sweeping  out  of  hollows  in  the  ground,  and  the  cleaning  of  gutters. 
It  will  not  be  contended  that  this  places  a  serious  burden  on  the 
householder. 
And  though  the  suggestion  may  be  unfamiliar  to  Jamaica,  and 
possibly  therefore  somewhat  unpalatable,  it  is  by  no  means  a  new 
one.  I  was  successful  some  years  ago,  in  Sierra  Leone,  in  getting  a 
clause  included  in  the  Sanitary  Ordinance,  making  it  a  punishable 
offence  to  have  mosquito  larvae  in  a  compound,  and  similar  laws 
have  been  passed  in  other  West  Indian  colonies,  and  are  actually 
being  put  in  force.  Sir  R.  Boyce,  who  has  just  returned  from  visiting 
the  other  colonies,  informs  me  that  prosecutions  are  being  daily 
undertaken,  and  that  fines  of  no  less  than  £2  are  being  inflicted,  with 
the  most  beneficial  results  in  diminishing  mosquitoes. 
A  very  appreciable  diminution  in  mosquitoes  can  then  be  effected 
by  simple  means,  the  principal  cost  at  first  being  {a)  cost  of  kerosene, 
and  (£)  wages  of  a  sufficient  number  of  men  (which  need  not  be  great) 
to  oil  and  keep  down  the  grass  and  weeds.  I  would  therefore 
summarise  the  anti-mosquito  measures  as  follows ;  not  in  the  order 
of  their  importance  but  of  their  practicability :  — 
1.  Make  the  harbouring  of  mosquito  larvae  in  private 
compounds  a  punishable  offence. 
2.  Keep  all  margins  of  rivers,  swamps,  water  channels, 
ditches,  gutters,  ponds  and  pools  free  from  grass  and  weeds. 
3.  Apply  crude  kerosene  regularly  to  all  possible  breeding 
places  of  mosquitoes. 
