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(orange) would curve round the head of the Thaua creek where it contracts,
opposite Thána town, to the narrow channel connecting it with the Bassein
creek, and would include Itáva, Kalva and Kopri. In this grassy tract of country-
through which the G. I. P. Railway runs, from G-hatkopar northwards, the hills
are too near the creek to leave room for villages so free from Malaria that a green
isosplen could be drawn at all. To he able to draw an isosplen in each of the four
colours one would have to start at the north-west side of the hills. Here the
red would begin at Masha and pass southwards through the hamlets of Dahisar,
and through Kákda. South of this the villages close to the hills are actually
deserted so that no Spleen Rate can be taken in them at all. The brown isos-
plen would begin, a little further out from the hills than the other, at Kashi, and
pass through Mira, then re-appear first at Devi, a hamlet of Magatna, and then
again to pasa through Bharodi and Pahadi. The orange would begin at Ghod-
bandar, a little further north than the others. Here the hills come right down
to the creek, and there is, so to speak, a direct conflict of opposing influences.
The sea-breezes do exert a marked effect, for Ghoclbandar has a much lower
Spleen Hate than any other village in Salsette commanded to such a degree by
the hills. This orange isosplen would pass through Dahisar, Kanheri, Babái,
Poisar and Gári. Outside it, and just before the tree and grass-covered country
gives place to the alluvial flats, one might draw a green isosplen of villages that
have a Spleen Eate of from five to ten per cent. It would start at Naytodi, and
run south through Borivli, Shimpivli, Kandivli, Valnai and Malád. West of
this, and fringing the sea-coast, is the long series of villages built on what ara
more or less islands separated by creeks and mud-flats from the mainland of
Salsette, which were mentioned in Chapter-1. In most of those villages there is
absolutely no Spleen Hate at all. In just one or two is there a rate worth
noticing. Thus Dongri village has two hamlets, Tarodi and Pali, that lie just
at the base of a small hill, one on each side of it. In their case there is thus a
reproduction in miniature of the conditions that bring about malariousness
elsewhere, and the one hamlet has a spleen rate of 6.5 percent.., and the other of
5.6 per cent. But, taking those places on the coast as a whole, from Bháyn-
dar on the north down to Bándra on the south, they are found to be all either
wholly free from Malaria, or affected by it to a perfectly negligible estant.
Turning to the north-east corner of Salsette, we find very malarious
conditions to the north of Thána. Though not quite so badly affected as those
nearer the hills, the villages on the Bassein creek have a considerable Spleen Rate ;
they are too far round the corner, so to speak, to get the benefit of the sea-
breezes. There are two villages deserted on account of Malaria here, Mánpára
and Elavesar ; the inhabitants of the latter have all shifted down to Wágbíl on
the creek-side. The case of Kolshefc, and its hamlet, Tari, the inhabitants of
which work the ferry for the Agra road traffic, is instructive. Kolshet is not
out of the jungle ; it is surrounded with trees and grass, and has a Spleen Rate
of 84 per cent. Tan is on the shore, beyond the edge of the trees, just a
•hundred yards or two down the road, and its Spleen Rate is less than half that
of Kolshet.
There now only remains for consideration a limited but important area
in the South of the island, bounded on the North by the hills, and on the South by
the Bándra creek. For the most part of this area is not under the influence of
the hills, but at the north-west and north-east corners of it are two places,
Andheri and Ghátkopar, which may be said to be just on the edge of the danger
zone. The Spleen Rate of Andheri, 27 per cent., would not be noticeable were
it not that nowhere south of it is there practically any Speen Rate to record
at all. At Ambivli, just north of Andheri, it is 4.5 per cent. A little further
still up along the Ghodbandar road we have on the right the deserted
village of Mogra, and on the left, on the slope of a grassy hill, a hamlet with
a Spleen Rate of 25 per cent.
At Ghátkopar the hill castes, who nowadays mostly work as rice-field
labourers, and whose work takes them to fields close to the hills, where they
camp out during the rice-harvest, have a Spleen Rate of 73 per cent. The
commercial classes, mostly Kacchi Bhattias who go to Bombay daily to their
business, but who are resident here all the year round, have a Spleen Rate