?17 labour, all concerned indirectly or directly with what we may term expansion. Quite recently epidemic malaria has attracted considerable at- tention in Murshidabad town; and in connection with this we quote a newspaper cutting, dated August 1908- " The mortality from fevers of which statistics are given in the report of the Sanitary Commissioner for Bengal is something almost past belief. Murshidabad among towns was the worst sufferer, the mortality amounting to 46.08 per mille. It is added that this is the third year in succession that this town has been the most fever- stricken. We read:-' The civil surgeon is strongly of opinion that the newly constructed branch of the Eastern Bengal State Railway has affected the public health'. He says that the Railway Engineer- ing authorities have been guilty as elsewhere of taking absolutely no means of draining the pits and hollows by the side of the embank- ments, that he is convinced that in such a malarious neighbourhood specially as that of Murshidabad town, this has led to increased un- healthiness and should be remedied." It is needless to say that more than borrow-pits and hollows are concerned. Time and further research must decide whether we have exag- gerated the importance of this matter, but if not, it seems to us that this factor in malaria must be recognised and dealt with; for there appears to be every probability that, when allowed to act year after year without attempt at control upon populations whose general health is already in a state of precarious stability, it may so far up- set this equilibriumm as to produce widespread outbreaks of disease amongst them. Industrial expansion in the tropics is but beginning; every year its requirements become more urgent; every year it is taking fresh strides; and on the threshold of every advance in India, as well as in every other tropical country, we are met with the necessity for this industrial aggregation of labour. 1SC C