CO885-(21-23) — Page 195

69

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

To Is To Le Tz 11

Reference :-

mmimmin C.O. 885

22

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

68

premises, it should be possible to place excellent accommodation at the disposal of the Bureau, and in the meantime he enquired whether any useful purpose would be served by offering the occasional use of other rooms. Dr. Bagshawe was doubtful whether occasional use would be of any advantage, and it was finally agreed that Mr. Harris should go over the ground with Dr. Bagshawe and consider what could be done in the way of additional accommodation, and that Dr. Bagshawe should be authorised to accept any arrangement which he might come to with Mr. Harris.

3. Dr. Bagshawe submitted a proposal that he should be authorised to obtain from time to time reviews by experts on specially important works. The expendi ture would not exceed about £20 a year, which could easily be provided for from the available funds. The books would be retained in the library and the payments would be either 10s. a page of about 600 words or a payment of, say, 10s. for 500 words. He believed that it would be possible to obtain contributors at those rates, e.g., Colonel Alcock was willing to write on that basis. Sir Ronald Ross expressed him- self as very favourably disposed to the scheme, and it was agreed that £30 should he placed at the disposal of the Director to be expended on reviews at a rate of £1 per 1,000 words with a minimum of 10s.

4. The question of inserting plates into the Bulletin was discussed. The Director explained that this was already done where the contributors asked to be allowed to have plates: while illustrations in the text were not infrequent. It was easy to have drawings made by the Librarian, and if it were desired in any case to reproduce a plate there would probably seldom be difficulty. Sir John Rose Brad- ford pointed out that it would be a waste of money to reproduce coloured plates, though he had no objection to illustrations in black and white: the Bulletin did not profess to contain original articles and those interested who desired to see plates should refer to the original papers. Dr. Bagshawe explained that it was not pro- posed to reproduce coloured plates, and it was only desired to insert plates where considered necessary to illustrate some special point in the summary.

5. The Committee considered the correspondence, a précis of which had been circulated, regarding the desire of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to receive advice with regard to the situation as to sleeping sickness in Angola and Principe: a further letter from the Foreign Office was also read, in the enclosure to which it was stated that great danger would be created if natives from the Province of Angola, which was stated to be much worse infected by sleeping sickness than the island of Principe, should be allowed to enter San Thomé and West Africa generally. Mr. Lister explained that the points on which the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs desired to be advised were two :-

(1) Was it undesirable that natives from Angola should be allowed to enter

Principe?

(2) Was it undesirable that they should be allowed to enter San Thome?

The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs was not concerned, he explained, with the question of emigration from Angola to West Africa generally.

Sir John Rose Bradford pointed out that this aspect of the question might be of importance to the Secretary of State for the Colonies if emigration was actually taking place or was likely to take place from Angola to British West Africa, since, although it was true that sleeping sickness existed in British West Africa, it would obviously be undesirable that natives from a country in which sleeping sickness was stated to be very prevalent should be allowed to proceed to West Africa. It was agreed that in the absence of any direct request for an expression of opinion on this subject, and in the absence of information as to emigration from Portuguese West Africa to British West Africa, it would not be necessary to give a formal expression of opinion on the question.

The question was discussed at length: Sir David Bruce and Dr. Bagshawe stated that it might be regarded as certain that no glossina palpalis existed on San Thomé. It was also mentioned that from a recent report on the action taken with regard to Principe it appeared that energetic efforts were being made to combat with the fly in that island, and that it was hoped that in a year's time it would be possible to free Principe altogether from the fly. It was also agreed that this process should he perfectly feasible, in view of the small size of the island.

The Committee finally agreed that it would be proper that the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs should be advised that the danger of the spread of the disease depended entirely on the simultaneous presence of infected individuals and

:

the fly that as the fly did not exist on San Thome there could be no danger of the extension of the disease from the introduction of infected labourers from Angola to the island that as regards Principe, while the fly existed, it appeared from the report referred to that vigorous measures were being taken to exterminate the fly on the island, and that if these attempts were successful further infection would become impossible that the prohibition of recruitment in Angola for service in Principe would apparently have the effect of interfering with the process of the extermination of the fly, and that, therefore, it would be undesirable to take any steps to prevent recruitment for service in Principe. At the worst, Angola seemed to be more seriously infected than Principe, and that, therefore, the movement of natives from Angola to Principe could not be disadvantageous to natives from Angola, and any possible dis- advantage to Principe would be more than counterbalanced by the probability that, by continuing the existing sanitary work, which was only possible through the im- portation of further supplies of labour, the fly on the island could be entirely exterminated.

6. Dr. Bagshawe mentioned that the question had been raised by the agents for the sales of the Bulletin, Messrs. Balliere, Tindall and Cox, whether there could not be included in the Bulletin a small section dealing with pharmaceutical products for the treatment of disease, analogous to the section devoted to such subjects in medical journals. The inclusion of such a section would probably mean a large increase in advertisements. The Committee unanimously agreed that such action was undesirable in a Government publication.

K

33308