PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
PIC.O. 885
20 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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of the action of the Belgians; to those parts these remarks do not apply. It must be remembered that we are not yet certain whether or not there exists an animal which can act as " reservoir host " for the human trypanosome and keep up infection in the flies in the absence of man; researches now being conducted in German East Africa and Uganda may decide this point.
There remain to be considered the cases of sleeping sickness in the camps, and it is well to realise that, kept under the best conditions, as they will be, well fed, and treated with the most efficient drugs at our disposal, their lives may be pro- longed for many years, though few, if any, may be cured. To give a recent instance, a native who had not been subject to infection for seven years died at Lisbon of sleeping sickness. The disposal of such chronic cases will be matter for future consideration. In Uganda they are allowed to leave the treatment camps on condi- tion that they do not settle in fly areas.
2. This danger was pointed out in the third bulletin of the Sleeping Sickness Bureau (January, p. 112); the passage is too long for quotation. I see no reason to doubt that Glossina palpalis formerly existed on the Zambesi, and it would not surprise me if it were found there in small patches still. I mentioned the subject at one of the Committee meetings of the Sleeping Sickness Bureau, and I was authorised to write to the Secretary of the British South Africa Company. In my letter, dated May 11th, 1909, I recommended the despatch of an entomologist or medical officer to search the Zambesi for palpalis.
There is no question that the danger is a real one. must be in railway communication with palpalis areas, and whatever measures of Sooner or later the Zambesi precaution are taken, it will be difficult to guard against the conveyance of flies. Besides travelling in dark corners of the carriages of passenger trains, they will Jurk in inaccessible places in goods wagons. Still, the danger can be minimised if a well-considered scheme is ready before the danger arises, and if all possible precautions are taken. Such a scheme would include the protection of passenger Coaches and cattle trucks with wire gauze as well as very careful inspection of trains at one or more points south of the most southerly source of palpalis touched. The greater the distance between the Zambesi and the nearest palpalis area the less the likelihood of flies travelling the whole distance; the engineers should bear this in mind as well as the undesirability of the railway track following and repeatedly crossing fly-infested streams. In any case much clearing will be essential.
Dr. Spillane writes: An example of this kind (conveyance of tsetse flies) has already occurred in the extension of the fly from the Congo basin to that of the Nile." I do not know on what this statement is founded. There is no reason to suppose that palpalis is a recent introduction to the Nile; the fly has probably existed there at least as long as on the Congo and its tributaries. There is no reason to doubt that the infection was brought in the usual way, that is, by the arrival of infected persons at a place where the insect carrier already was. does not, however, affect Dr. Spillane's argument.)
(This
September 7th, 1909.
ARTHUR G. BAGSHAWE.
39
3. The discovery may prove of scientific value, or at least of interest to such institutions as the London and Liverpool Schools of Tropical Medicine and bodies engaged in similar work, to whom, if your Lordship so pleases, copies might be communicated.
I have, &c.,
CAVENDISH BOYLE.
G
Enclosure in No. 19.
ACTING DIRECTOR, Medical and Health Department, to THE HONOURABLE THE COLONIAL SECRETARY. (No. C/1036.) Discovery by Dr. Lafont of a flagellated organism in the juice of certain plants.
ADVERTING to your letter, No. C.S.O. 13/09, on the above subject, I beg to forward herewith, along with the original, which is returned, an English translation of Dr. Lafont's report furnished by the Director of the Bacteriological Laboratory.
L. G. BARBEAU,
Acting Director.
24th July, 1909.
DIRECTOR OF THE BacteriologicAL LABORATORY, Réduit, to His EXCELLENCY SIR CAVENDISH BOYLE, Governor of Mauritius and its Dependencies. YOUR EXCELLENCY,
I HAVE the honour to transmit herewith, through the Medical and Health Department, a report upon the discovery which we have just made in Mauritius of some curious plant-parasites, hitherto unknown.
This discovery being likely to prove of a certain interest and lead to further and interesting investigations all the world over, I beg to submit that it may be communicated, at an early date, to the Colonial Office.
I would request that the French text be annexed to the English text, owing to inherent difficulties in translating technical terms.
I have, &c.,
A. LAFONT.
30832
(No. 213.)
MY LORD,
No. 19.
MAURITIUS.
THE GOVERNOR to THE SECRETARY OF STATE. (Received 16 September, 1909.)
Government House, Port Louis, 31st July, 1909.
I HAVE the honour to transmit herewith copies of correspondence with the Director of the Medical and Health Department, giving_cover to a report of the Director of the Bacteriological Laboratory wherein Dr. Lafont describes the dis- covery of a flagellated organism in the juice (suc) of certain plants.
2. To the report, which is transmitted in the original French text, is appended an English translation* made by the author.
• Translation only printed.
INVESTIGATION OF THE BACTERIOLOGICAL LABORATORY, Réduit. COMMUNICATION upon the presence of a parasite of the species Flagellata in the juice of certain herbs of the spurge family (Euphorbiacea)
"Microscopically see and examine everything and anything," whenever the current work on hand admits of same, is our incessant advice to our fellow-workers This stimulus cannot fail to be pregnant of results, of which here is an instance:— Our attendant, David, having placed between a slide and cover-slip under the microscope a drop of the milk of a well-known plant, the Euphorbia pilulifera, commonly called "Jean Robert,” observed in the opalescent juice of certain of these plants the presence of a mobile parasite.
Mr. Maya and myself thereupon proceeded to investigate the parasite in the fresh condition.
It has a self-undulating motion and, as a rule, displaces itself rather slowly. It has not the worm-like wriggling motion sometimes observed in the trypanosoma Eransi and certain others. Its slow motion may be due to the viscosity of the liquid, as well as to the gummy and resinous particles therein met with in abundance. Magnified 700 diameters, the parasite appears to be at times filiform and at others bulging towards the middle, according to its period of evolution. certain cases, is considerably enhanced; it then describes some more or less proxi
Its mobility, in mate curves, alternating to the right and left, without leaving the field of the micro- scope. Sometimes it appears to bear some resemblance to a minute tadpole seen swimming in the midst of the liquid. These parasites may be observed in the living state between the slide and cover-glass during 6 to 7 hours. time they become motionless and appear to be dead.
After that length of