When Col. Gorgas came to the Isthmus the two towns Panama and Colon were well fitted to be breeding places for pestilence. Neither had sewers nor any drainage system. The streets of Panama were paved after a fashion with cobblestones and lined with gutters through which the liquid refuse of the town trickled slowly or stood still to fester and grow putrescent under the glowing rays of the tropic sun. Colon had no pavement whatsoever. Neither town had waterworks and the people gathered and stored rainwater in cisterns and pottery jars which afforded fine breeding places for the mosquito. As a matter of fact, the whole Isthmus, not the towns alone, furnishes plenty of homes for the mosquito. With a rainy season lasting throughout eight months in the year much of the soil is waterlogged. The stagnant back waters of small streams; pools left by the rains; the footprints of cows and other animals filled up with rain water quickly breed the wrigglers that ultimately become mosquitoes. Mr. A. H. Jennings, the entomologist of the Commission, has identified 125 varieties of the mosquito, of which, however, the _anopheles_ and the _stegomyia_ are the ones peculiarly obnoxious to man. The others are merely the common or summer resort variety of mosquito with a fondness for ankles and the back of one’s hand, which can be observed any time on Long Island or in New Jersey without the expense of a trip to Panama. A careful study of literary authorities indicates to me that at this point in the description of the mosquito plague on the Isthmus it is proper to indulge in humorous reflections upon the fact that the bite of the female only is dangerous. But, given the fact, the humorous applications seem so obvious that the reader may be trusted to draw them for himself--it would be idle to say “herself”, for the women will not see anything humorous about it at all. [Illustration: COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY F. E. WRIGHT PANAMA BAY FROM ANCON HOSPITAL There are few more beautiful spots in the world than the grounds of Ancon Hospital. French taste selected the site, a French nun set out the first trees and shrubs, and nature has completed a charming picture.]