Licence: In copyright
Credit: The prevention of malaria. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.
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![and Caventou extracted the alkaloid quinine from it. But the discovery of this specific has not only proved to be a blessing for the treatment of untold millions of human beings, but also enabled Morton [1697] and Torti [1753] to separate the malarial fevers, which are cured by it, from those upon which it has no influence, and by this means to differentiate and study the symptoms of the former. Morton also recalled the old hypothesis of the marsh ; and this was amplified by Lancisi, who repeated the views of Varro and Columella in greater detail in his book De noxiis pallidum effluviis. He stated that fevers disappear after drainage, and attributed the poison either to inorganic or organic emanations from the marsh. He studied mosquitos, and even suggested inoculation by them as a possible means of infection—though he also thought that their larvae foul drinking water [1717]. It is now apparent that the world had been gradually becoming aware during centuries of the paludic nature of malarial fever, not by direct experiment or even by investiga- tion, but by a kind of subconscious experience based on public observations. In Italy especially, where of all civilised countries the disease was most prevalent, this process was most apparent —so much so that, as North describes [1896], the peasantry can often tell at sight which localities are likely to be malarious. More than this, by similar general observation, the good effect of assainment of marshes had become equally notorious there. Thus, as early as 1667, Doni wrote a work called De Restituenda Salubritate Agri Romani; and references to a succession of works carried out on this principle, which I now call the principle of Mosquito Reduction, are given by Celli [1901]. At the same time efforts were made by many observers, such as Morton, Lancisi, Lind, Pringle, to explain the paludic connection ; and these resulted in the formation of the hypothesis of the paludic miasma. This was supposed to be some kind of infecting emanation from stagnant water, either chemical, or as Lancisi suggested, organic; but in no](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21351600_0031.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
