cuse to the lake. Farther west they came to the Genesee river which they followed scores of miles to the south making its valley, for many years, the largest region of wheat in the country; so they pushed steadily westward opening farms and planting towns along the lakes and the rivers flowing into them.

The facts of nature pointed unmistakably to the appropriate sites for towns. As the pioneers floated down the Ohio they came to the great bend of the river where it changes its course from northwest to southwest. When settlement spread away from the river not all the freight floated down the stream was destined for places farther southwest. There were towns to the northwest to be supplied and transship

ment of freight to land routes was necessary; at this place of transshipment the city of Cincinnati arose. Still farther down the Ohio the river was impeded by rapids making another transshipment of freight necessary and this fact resulted in the city of Louisville.

If we were to trace the history of our entire material progress we should find that the waterways of the eastern half of the country have been the main factors in determining the lines of development. Those persons who were able to interpret the meaning of the natural facts presented for their study have reaped large rewards. A young farmer started from St. Paul one day on a little steamer that was to be pushed as far up the Minnesota River as possible. He was

looking for some very desirable preëmption claim on which to begin farming. When the steamer finally stuck in the mud he said to himself: "It is right here that I want my 160 acres." He filed his claim and farmed the land till he sold it about ten years later for $25,000 to be divided into lots for the town of St. Peter which was rising at the head of navigation.

No great country, however extensive its railroad facilities may be, can afford to neglect its water highways. Notwithstanding our river and harbor bills and our Mississippi Commission we know little as yet of the scientific development of waterways for commercial purposes as it is understood in all the countries of northwestern and northcentral Europe where boats freighted on the Vistula in Russia may reach, through rivers and canals, all the leading ports of the Baltic and North Seas. Increasing density of population and towns and cities more thickly scattered over our domain will impress us, as Europe has been impressed, with the absolute necessity of supplementing our railroads with the fullest possible development of our water routes. In the past few years we have seen the Mississippi transforming New Orleans into one of the great wheat ports as well as the greatest cotton port of the world. We see the Ohio and the Mississippi carrying coal, iron and lumber 2,000 miles at a cost very little in excess of ocean freights; and though the Erie Canal, which provides the port of New York with a continuous waterway to Duluth is antiquated and inadequate, it has made the Hudson River, with its 18,000,000 tons of freight a year, the largest commerce carrier among the rivers of America; it was the leading factor in giving to New York a commercial movement nearly equal to that of London. We have witnessed the development of our marine on the Great Lakes where marvelously cheap freights

have helped us to compete with the world in iron and steel goods though we carry most of our iron ore nearly 1,000 miles to the coke and limestone required to smelt it.

OUR TOPOGRAPHY FACILITATED RAILROAD DEVELOPMENT

A country as vast as ours and with as small a density of population could not so early have attained its present development if our enormous system of communications had not afforded the lowest land freight routes in the world. A good topographic map shows us that the topography of the country was very favorable for the building of the vast systems of railroads whose mileage, extending to the neighborhood of most of our farms, would stretch nearly from the earth to the moon. There are gateways through our mountain ranges so that none of them is a barrier to commerce. We have no obstacle like the Pyrenees which so completely walls France from Spain that the land traffic between them must be deflected from straight lines to circumvent the extreme ends of the mountains at the edge of the seas. The comparatively level surface of our plains and plateaus, the predominating easy gradients and the mountain passes have helped to cheapen railroad construction and transportation so that commodities. may be cheaply moved. Argentina raises its export wheat within fifty miles of tidewater. We send our export wheat 1,000 miles to tidewater but the price of freight has been so cheap that we are able to compete with any nation in the world in exporting this commodity.

What a reservoir for future harvests of breadstuffs is our hard wheat region of Minnesota and the Dakotas, a part of the central plain of North America that is twice as large as Great Britain and Ireland or as New York and New England together, and larger than the German Empire. These three states are producing much more than one-half

of the spring wheat of the country and we know that their capacity for production may be more than doubled. The Canadian northwest is boasting that its younger wheat fields are yielding twice as much grain to the acre as our lands; England with less favorable conditions for wheat culture than we enjoy raises more than double the quantity of grain to the acre than we produce.

We may say of our entire agricultural interest that we shall double our production when we improve our methods. We cannot measure yet the potential benefits which our Agricultural Department and the agricultural schools will confer upon the nation by their persistent teaching of scientific methods of tillage. A man near the east end of Long Island is demonstrating every year that the highest grade of farming gives the best profits. He spends money without stint for fertil

izers; all his operations are kept to the highest point of efficiency and he is selling his crop of vegetables, the product of 80 acres, at an average figure of $20,000 a year. He is making as much money from the soil as he could from any other business with the same amount of capital.

The mistake is sometimes made of attributing to one factor more than its due share in bringing about the advanced stage of development we have reached. The attention of no American audience, however, needs to be called to the fact that in this nation of highly intelligent laborers, of inventive genius and of boundless energy and ambition, the geographic conditions that have so wonderfully helped us and some of which have been the topic of this brief discourse are only one of the all-potent influences which have advanced us to the rank we occupy among the great nations.

HE United States has driven the bubonic plague out of the Philippines as completely as it has swept yellow fever out of Cuba.

The ravages of Asiatic cholera, which have claimed 100,000 victims in the islands, have diverted public attention from a fight against the bubonic plague waged by the health officers of Manila. This remarkable fight has no precedent in the history of the plague. If it had not been for the tireless vigilance and ceaseless war on rats and filth by Dr Meacham and his subordinates a wave of the plague would have swept over Manila and the islands as destructive of life as the cholera itself.

The plague is always present at Hongkong. There is not a day in the year

when some plague-stricken wretch is not trying to hide in the densely packed quarters of that city. Manila, 600 miles across the sea, must therefore be constantly on her guard lest the plague slip in on one of the many vessels plying between the two ports.

The day after Christmas, 1899, a man was found in the streets of Manila dead from bubonic plague. The disease had invaded the city and began to spread.

How the plague was fought and beaten is told by Hon. Dean C. Worcester, Secretary of the Interior of the insular government, in his report to the Philippine Commission for 1902.

Bubonic plague was discovered at Manila December 26, 1899, and slowly

but steadily increased up to December, 1901.*

The deaths in 1900 numbered 199, and in 1901 reached a total of 432. The disease was at its worst each year during the hot, dry months of March, April, and May, nearly or quite disappearing during September, October, November, and December. It will be noted that the number of cases in 1901 exceeded that in 1900 by 200, while the number of deaths was about two and a half times as great, and the percentage of mortality among persons attacked increased from 73.4 in 1900 to 91.7 in 1901.

This heavy increase in plague for the year 1901 justified the apprehension that a severe epidemic would occur in 1902. Strenuous efforts were made to improve the general sanitary condition of the city, but the habits of the Chinese residents and the lower class of Filipinos were such as to render the enforcement of proper sanitary regulations well-nigh impossible.

On account of the important part which house rats are known to play in the distribution of bubonic plague, a systematic campaign was inaugurated against these rodents in Manila. Policemen, sanitary inspectors, and specially appointed rat-catchers were furnished with traps and poison, and both traps and poison were distributed to private

individuals under proper restrictions. A bounty was paid for all rats turned over to the health authorities, and stations were established at convenient points throughout the city where they could be received. Each rat was tagged with the street and number of the building or lot from which it came, was dropped into a strong antiseptic solution, and. eventually sent to the Biological Laboratory, where it was subjected to a bacteriological examination for plague. During the first two weeks 1.8 per cent of the rats examined were found to be infected. This proportion steadily increased, reaching the alarming maximum of 2.3 per cent in October. At this time numerous rats were found dead of plague in the infected districts, and, in view of the fact that epidemics of plague among the rats of a city in the past have been uniformly followed by epidemics among human beings, the gravest apprehension was felt, the rapid spread of the disease among the rats after the weather had become comparatively dry being a particularly unfavorable symptom.

It was deemed necessary to prepare to deal with a severe epidemic, and a permanent detention camp, capable of accommodating 1,500 persons, was accordingly established on the grounds of the San Lazaro Hospital. Hoping against hope, the board of health redoubled its efforts to combat the disease. The force of sanitary inspectors was greatly increased, and under the able supervision of Dr Meacham their work was brought to a high degree of efficiency. Frequent house-to-house inspections were made in all parts of the city where the disease was known to exist. The sick were removed to the hospital if practicable; otherwise they were cared for where found and the spread of infection. guarded against.

Plague houses were thoroughly disinfected, and their owners were compelled, under the direction of the assistant sani

tary engineer, to make necessary alterations. Cement ground floors were laid, double walls and double ceilings, affording a refuge for rats, were removed, defects in plumbing were remedied, whitewash was liberally used, and, in general, nothing was left undone that could render buildings where plague had occurred safe for human occupancy. Buildings incapable of thorough disinfection and renovation were destroyed. Buildings in which plague rats were taken were treated exactly as were those where the disease attacked the human occupants. The bacteriological examination of rats enabled the board of health to follow the pest into its most secret haunts and fight it there, and was the most important factor in the winning of the great success which was ultimately achieved.

With very few exceptions, there was no recurrence of plague in buildings which had been disinfected and renovated. As center after center of infection was found and destroyed the percentage of diseased rats began to decrease, and in January, 1902, when, judging from the history of previous years, plague should have again begun to spread among human beings, there was not a single case. In February one case occurred. In March there were two cases, as against 63 in March of the preceding year, and before April the disease had completely disappeared.

This result, brought about at a time when the epidemic would, if unchecked, have reached its height for the year, marked the end of a fight begun by the board of health on the day of its organization and prosecuted unremittingly under adverse conditions for seven months with a degree of success which has not been equaled under similar conditions in the history of bubonic plague.

Especial credit is due to Chief Health Inspector Meacham for the ingenuity which he displayed in devising means for the destruction of rats and for the tireless energy with which he devoted

himself to securing their adoption, and to increasing the efficiency of his force of inspectors, as well as to Drs. J. W. Jobling and Edward A. Southall and their assistants, who worked unremittingly at the uncongenial and dangerous task of making a bacteriological examination of rats, a large proportion of which were putrid, while not a few of them were infected with one of the most fatal of diseases. This work was of necessity conducted in the inadequate building in which it has been necessary temporarily to house the bureau of government laboratories, in close proximity to the civil hospital. The fact that not a single case of infection occurred among the laboratory force or the inmates of the hospital is sufficient commentary upon the care with which it was performed.

During 1901 plague appeared at several points in the provinces near Manila. Agents of the board of health were promptly dispatched to the infected municipalities and radical remedial measures were adopted, including in several instances the burning of infected buildings, the result being the complete disappearance of plague in the provinces as well as in Manila.*

A few figures will still further impress the American with the magnitude of this fight by his representatives in the Philippines. Of the 60,000 rats caught, tagged, and sent to the laboratory, 40,666 were examined microscopically for bacilli, and of these 242 were found infested with plague. During one month 65,379 traps were set and 403,789 plates of rat bane placed by the rat-catching squads, who had a special uniform and cap. The kind of poison had to be frequently changed, as the rats were very wary and suspicious. It is estimated that several hundred thou sand rats were killed by the poison;

*Report of the Philippine Commission for 1902, vol. I, pp. 263-265. Government Printing Office, 1903.