The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-05-31

mission, headed by DR.. Walter Reed,
succeeded in laying at the door of the
mosquito the responsibility for the
spread Of yellow fever, that saucy lit
tie insect has had its home and it's
habits pried into on every hand, and
in ten years the world has learned more
about it than in all the generations
before And still the scientist is not
satisfied with what he has learned of
it, but is studying with more deterni-
nation than ever. A few decades ago
men knew that there were only a few
species, or tribes of mosquitoes. Now
they know 400 species, and the end is
not yet.
One of the most interesting addi-
tons to our knowledge of the mos
quito is that just given out by the
Smithsonian Institution, which is the
result of the Investigations made by
August Busck of the mosquito life
along the Panama canal. By patient
search, covering the end of one dry
season and the beginning of the fol-
lowing rainy season, he was able to
get together 80 different kinds of them.
Some of them were good, others were
bad, and a few were Indifferent. The
good ones seemed to make a bust
ness Of eating the young of the bad
ones while the indifferent ones did no
more harm than to bite whenever OPP
portunity offered. Thirty of the species
he found were entirely new to science,
and it is his opinion that continued
search would reveal still others. But
even the present knowledge of the
isthmian mosquito shows more diff
ferent species in that territory than
in any other territory Of equal size in
the world.
There are three kinds of mosquitoes
which are most familiar to the lay
man, just as the Smith, Brown ana
Jones families are said to be the most
numerous in the English-speaking
world. The most familiar of the mos
quito families is the Culex. There ara
dozens of different branches of this
family, but the kinship is not 50 re-
mote but that the entomologist can
trace the likeness. This Culex family
of mosquitoes is a very reputable one.
OF course it bites, and is very bother
some at times, but yet it has never
been convicted of any high crimes
and misdemeanors, such, for instance,
as the spread of disease.
Next to the Culexes are the Anopheles.
There is but little to be said in their
behalf, though they are able to put
up a pretty defense. They are the
carriers of the malaria germ. Science
has not<made out a good case against
the whole family, and it appears that
there are some of them which do not
deserve the opprobrium that the SUI
ferer from chills and fever hurts at
the whole tribe But the most of them
do spread malaria They, however,
take a different view of the situation.
From their standpoint it is man that
gives them malaria, and they only
return it with interest
lit happens this way. Here is a
splendid looking specimen of the mos
quito kinda female always. She hap
pens to meet with person on her.
travels. and she concludes to suck a
little blood She never heard of such
a thing as malaria, and the person
. does not advise her of the fact that
he has it. The result is a sick mos
quito, suffering from malaria. She
loafs around awhile, nursing herself
back to health, and when she gets well
enough to travel about again, she gets
a thirst for human gore once more,
and bites some other person. She has
a little saw and spear with which she
attacks him, and in order to aid in the
extraction Of the blood she puts
little saliva into the wound she makes.
It so happens that in this saliva is the
germ that she caught from biting the
other person, and in this way the sec
ond person gets it. When this germ
lands into the second human body it
attacks the red corpuscles in the
blood. The germ multiplies with
lightning rapidity, and the chills and
fever follow the breaking of the cor
puscles asunder in great numbers.
The third family, known to the lay
man, is the Stegomyia. This is the
family that is responsible for the
spread of yellow fever. Some of the
members aret probably innocent, but
the whole family has been put under
the ban. This family constitutes the
aristocracy of the mosquito world.
These mosquitoes wish no mud puddles
for their homes, no dwelling places
in swamps. They want fashionable
quarters near human beings. They
want clean quarters, too. These quar-
tiers must be rain barrels, vases, idle,
water buckets and such places. They
like to live in peoples houses, and to
| adjust their habits to those of the
household, while the Anopheles family
insist on coming around after bedtime.
! The health of each member Of the
| Stegomyia family is always good I'M
| til one happens to bite some person
who has yellow fever. Through drink
| ing this sick persons blood, it gets a
| germ into its little inside that makes
| il sick This germ eats through the
| walls of the mosquitoes stomach and
| plays other bad tricks. At the end of
| Il days that germ has become a live
| wire even though it is so fine that
| the best microscope fails to reveal it.
| When an infected mosquito wants an
| other dinner of human blood and bites
| a person. it hands back the germ Il
| inadvertently took from the yellow
fever patient it had bitten before This