Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-10-07
A TITANIC WAR ENDS AS
YELLOW FEVER SURRENOERS

General Gorgass Great Victory at Quay
aquI, Last Lair of the Pest Affects
the Whole Course of Civilization
A MOTHER world war is over.
n After PIP years of tragic struggle,
after the, slaughter of millions-white
men, black men, red men, brown men
the lethal fray which began when
Charles Stuart was fighting to save his
English crown and Louis the Magnifi-
cent was bedizening his French regalia
with spurious jewels is over and peace
has been declared.
The difference between this peace and
that of Ryswck in 1897, of Utrecht in
1913, of Aix-la-C -Chapelle in 1748, of Paris
in 1888 of Paris In 1783 of Amiens in
1902, of Vienna in 1814-15, of Guadalupe
Hidalgo in 1S4S, Of Frankfort in 1870, of
Portsmouth in 1905 and even--if the pes
simists are heeded--of Paris in 1919, is
that it marks the decisive and absolute
determination of the foe.
There is every heartening reason for
believing that the peace of Guayaquil
will hold 1t may even be safely as
sumed that Senators Hitchcock and
Lodge would be in perfect accord on this
point.
When the news of the peace Of Guaya-
quill hummed over the wires yesterday
mankind refrained from any manifesto
tion of ecstatc frenzy. A world holiday
was not proclaimed. No salutes to sig
nalize the event were fired. No uproar-
ious mobs paraded metropolitan streets,
no tempests Of confetti, no paper "snow-
storms" drove the armies of photograph
ers to prodigies Of zeal.
Given the report of an armistce in one
of mankind's period wars against itself,
and the globe reels in deirium.
Given the announcement that the yell
low-fever scourge has been conquered,
and temperamental humanity is as i'm
passive as the Sphinx of Gizeh.
But if Stephen .Girard We're alive to-
day he would understand the news. So
would those superb American martyrs,
Walter F. Reed and James Carroll.
So, one may be sure, does Major Gen
era William c. Gorgas, former surgeon
general of the United States army. In
fact, he made the peace Of Guayaquil.
He signed many of the antecedent
treaties which led up to it. He carried
it we'll beyond the armistice stage into
that of unconditional surrender
1t is upon the word of this untiring
generalissimo that the world is informed
that yellow fever has been eradicated
from the earth.
In, tbo fav min, mort Mt communities
where the scourge still feebly exists it
is destined quickly to burn itself out"
Guayaouil was the last major plague
spot The fell disease, hunted from end
to end of the temperate and tropical
Americas and even in some parts of
Europe. was eventually confined to
single stronghold-the steaming coast of
the republic of Ecuador.
Some months ago General Gorgas or
ganized the last drive of his health bat
talions against this poisonous lair. Like
all real heroes, the former surgeon gen.
eral is modest When he affixes his seal
of victory there is no question that it
has been thoroughly won.
Yellow fever was an American blight,
and it is therefore fitting that its extinc-
ton can be validly rated as an American
triumph.
| The first responsible account of it
comes from Bridgetown, in the Barbados,
in l647 Soon afterward it broke out in
| Jamaica.
Later it swept into Peru, Ecuador and
! Brazil and in the early years of the
| nineteenth century it held grim sway
| over virtually all the inhabited portions
! of the American continent.
! Philadelphia experienced it's cruel
ravages- which Girard, among other
noble figures, strove so energetically to
assuage.
When middle-aged men of today were
! children New Orleans was tragically in
( fected with the contagion. At times it
even crossed the ocean, appearing in the
, Spanish and Portuguese coast towns
Asia, breeding place of so many plaques
was mercifully spared.
1t was popularity believed that the ad-
mirable result of the Spanish American
War was the deathknell of Spanish
colonial rule. That of course, was the
expected performance. 1t was brilliant
and stimulating. But it is arguable
whether the unforeseen consequence was
j not in the long run more momentous.
Cuba was a terribly treacherous "Pear
of the Antilles" in 1898. For more thar
two centuries it had been helpless pre-,
to the dread "fievre amarilla" Back il
1881, DR.. Carlos Finlay, of Havana, haC
advanced the theory that mosquitoe,
were the source of the yellow fever in
fection. But his opinion bore little frui
until during the American regime in tn,
island, Carroll and Reed, heading al
American sanitary commission, gave W
their lives in testing the terrible potency