Show MALARIA th invisible agent which gums sickness ani possible death so far llie century what then 19 this invisible agent which carries sickness and death so far afield and has the power to weaken the energy and stunt the growth of those who are doomed to live on malarial soil e do not live said an inhabitant of the marshes to a stranger we die malaria constitutes utes the chief obstacle to theeb and colonization of tho african continent and threatens thre atena to reduce to the condition of a desert vast tracts of the southern states of america which BO long as they were cultivated by the cearo race which better than any other resists its action cicero in allusion to romulus having built rome remarks that he selected a spot in a pestilential region locum deleget in at one time a terrible epidemic visited rome which carried off multitudes of the inhabitants including athe dictator toward the close of this visitation the earth opened in the torum doubtless by volcanic action which waa probably also the cause of the poisonous rising from the bowels of the earth indeed the volcanic nature of the italian peninsula generally may be taken into the lisi of causes which contribute to its the volcanic soil of italy we are told acts aa a sponge in and retaining an immense quantity of mosi lure hence after period of drought the tropical rains which fall steadily for days together make but little impression on the surface of the parched earth till the underlying sponge is saturated the overflow then becomes sud ilin the brooka rapidly nil every extinct crater becomes a lake every valey a and the country a universal swamp so long ago as years before christ the connection between the fever and the swamp was fully recognized in that region of the earth but although true that the disease is more pro valent in the lowly ing ground it may also be found in the higher altitudes where soil temperature and moisture favor its production still it doea not haunt the damp and marshy places alone for even in dry sunbaked sun baked parts of the earth the malaria finds egress through the fissures of the soil keeping its base of in the roo future far beneath if ahn upper crust is unbroken and dry it acts as a barrier against the egress of germa from below just as a of water over land neutralizes fur the time being tho necessary conditions of activity when the surface water is withdrawn by the heat of the summer sun and the oxygen of the air cornea into direct contact with the vegetation underneath there in all probability may bo discovered the homo of the deadly malaria |