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I PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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peculiar diseases and it was utterly impossible to train a medical man in England for service in Jamaica, India, or Africa. Why should a poor colony like Jamaica be asked to give men money to qualify for practice abroad ! Let them do it at their own expense. They would find in the public hospital ten or a dozen diseases which were indigenous to Jamaica and to be found in no other country. They had no bubonic plague in Jamaica and fevers of the West Coast of Africa were found neither in India nor Jamaica. Let any man who wanted to qualify for practice in Jamaica come to the public hospital. He would like that money spent on the hospital if necessary for the assistance of medical men coming to Jamaica who were strangers. There were about 25 Jamaicans nearly full fledged in England and he would like to see the money spent on a new operating room made sufficiently commodious for the attendance of the young men coming out from England who could observe the diseases of the Island as treated by qualified surgeons, and he might say that the results obtained at the hospital, especially if the lack of proper appliances was taken into account, were wonderful.

The Colonial Secretary did not think that the hon, member for St. Ann had carefully studied His Excellency's message to the Council. The scheme did not only propose to train medical men prior to going, but that they should have an opportunity of studying the various tropical diseases of the world, and there was also a proposal to found a college for the study of tropical malaria. There was another circular stating that the scheme would include the study of bacillus of malaria. The Gold Coast, Lagos, and the Niger Protectorate were each contributing £1,000 to the scheme, and Jamaica was asked to contribute £500 distributed over two years.

Dr. Mosse said that the scheme of the Secretary of State for the Colonies was a very good one, and if carried out would be followed by good results. If an experimental Commission were to visit the tropics to inquire on the spot into such fevers as yellow and malarial fevers, of which very little was known, he was convinced that they must derive great benefit from it. He was fully in accord with the views of the hon. member for St. Ann as to the admirable results obtained at the Public Hospital. They surpassed the results obtained in the United Kingdom in spite of the fact that the appliances were not up to date by reason of their resources being so low. He dared to say that if he had the £250 at his disposal he could dispose of it in another way to better advantage, but nevertheless he thought it would be spent advantageously as proposed.

Dr. Pringle said that Jamaica must derive very great benefit from such a scheme. It was quite possible that an investigation by scientific men into the malaria bacillus might bring about the end of that disease. A treatment might be found that would render malaria as innocuous as small-pox had become by vaccination; if there could be done for yellow fever and malaria what had been done for small-pox, they would be more than compensated.

Mr. Corinaldi said that they could not afford it.

Question put, with the following result:—

Ayes: Messrs. de Mercado, Sewell, Walcott, Dixon, Macnce, Johnston, Clarke,

Braham, Gideon, Corinaldi, (10).

The official vote was not taken.

The motion was carried and the vote struck out.

29383.

No. 206.

CEYLON.

MR. CHAMBERLAIN to LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR SIR E. NOEL WALKER. (Sent 6.20 p.m., June 7, 1899.)

TELEGRAM.

[Answered by No. 209.]

Referring to your telegram of 29th December and my despatch of 6th January," may Crown Agents transfer £1,000 from Ceylon funds to special fund for Tropical School and Malaria Commission.

* Nos. 145 and 149.

9017.

No. 207.

FEDERATED MALAY STATES.

MR. CHAMBERLAIN to HIGH COMMISSIONER SIR C. B. H. MITCHELL. (No. 141.)

SIR,

WITH reference to my despatch No. 77 of the 10th of March last, relative to the

Downing Street, June 9, 1899. contributions of the Straits Settlements and the Federated Malay States towards the cost of the School of Tropical Medicine and the Malaria Commission, I should be glad if you would inform me whether the Federated Malay States contribution of $5,000 towards the expenses of the Malaria Commission may now be paid over to the fund by the Crown Agents for the Colonies.

I have, &c.,

13462.

SIR,

No. 208.

J. CHAMBERLAIN.

COLONIAL OFFICE to THE ROYAL SOCIETY. [Answered by No. 211.]

Downing Street. June 9, 1899.

I AM directed by Mr. Secretary Chamberlain to request you to lay before the Malaria Investigation Committee the enclosed copy of a letterf from Dr. Daniels written from Blantyre and dated the 14th of April. It will be seen that he calls attention to

(a.) The cost of living.

(b.) The desirability of raising the limit of expenditure on an expedition from £10 to £20.

?

(c.) The scarcity of Malarial cases in British Central Africa.

(d.) The non-receipt of certain reports on cases of Blackwater Fever.

2. The questions raised in this letter are for the Committee to determine, and I venture

to make the following remarks upon them.

(a.) The maintenance allowance of £100 per annum was fixed by the Committee aud formally communicated to the observers. A copy of the letter to Dr. Daniels is enclosed,

I have no doubt that the allowance is small but until it is quite clear what will be the whole sum available for the expenses of the Commission it is desirable to keep expenses well in hand. I would therefore propose that each of the three gentlemen in question be paid maintenance allowance at the rate of £125 per annum instead of £100 per annum from the date of reaching Blantyre till the date of departure from British Central Africa, but that the additional £25 be treated for the present in each case as an advance. is possible that when the Commission goes to West Africa, they may be provided with quarters by the Colonial Governments, and, if so, the scale of maintenance allowance should be revised.

(b.) The sum of £10 allowed for expeditions had better be doubled.

(c.) The scarcity of cases of Malarial Fever in British Central Africa seems to point

to shortening the stay of the Commission at Blantyre, but the Committee will no doubt await the further letter which Dr. Daniels promises.

(d.) The reports referred to by Dr. Daniels seem to have been forwarded to the Royal Society in a letter from this office of the 9th of December last. Dr. Daniels' letter will be answered as soon as I am in possession of the views of the Committee.

I am, &c.,

C. P. LUCAS.

• No. 176.

† No. 204.

‡ No. 102.

No. 130.

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