21 DECEMBER 1907, Page 17

TSETSE-FLY AND SLEEPING SICKNESS.

[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—In your comment on Mr. Tallack's letter in the last issue of the Spectator you say, and very justly, that if big-

game is the cause of the tsetse, and the tsetse the cause of sleeping sickness, big-game must go. But is it not an argu- ment in favour of the tsetse not being the cause of sleeping sickness that the original home of this terrible disease was Nigeria and the West of Africa, where for ages there has

been neither big-game nor tsetse; or if the tsetse is there and so has survived the big-game, big-game cannot be the source of the tsetse ? Also, I fancy it is only recently that sleeping

sickness has spread towards Uganda, where formerly big-game must have been in excess of what it is now. Again, may not the tsetse lay its eggs in camels, donkeys, &c.—its bite not affecting them is no reason why it should not do so—and so the extermination of many noble animals prove futile P-1 am,