I may appear to have entered with unnecessary detail into this subject, but it is apparent that this fungoid skin disease, disseminated as it is by personal contact and other similar agencies, would have reached these sub-central Pacific Groups long ago if they had been occupied through ages by their present inhabitants. The same evidence, therefore, which can be brought forward to prove the recent appearance of this disease amongst the natives of these groups may also be advanced in support of the recent occupation of these islands by the eastern Polynesians.
From the previous remarks on the distribution of Tokelau Ringworm it may be inferred that in New Guinea and in the islands of the Malay Archipelago we have the home of the disease. From this region it has spread eastward towards the centre of the Pacific; and we may also infer that this eastward extension of the disease has occurred within the last three hundred years, since in the accounts which Gallego and Quiros give of the natives of the Solomon, Santa Cruz, and New Hebrides Groups at the time of their first discovery by the Spaniards, there is no reference to the prevalence of any cutaneous disease, which, if it had existed, would most certainly have attracted the notice of these early navigators.
I only had one opportunity of treating this affection, and that was in the person of a native of Guadalcanar, who was shipped on board as an interpreter, and who had been the subject of the disease for about five months. Partly from its obstinacy, and partly from the difficulty of ensuring that the remedies were regularly and thoroughly employed, my experience was not very satisfactory. Sulphur ointment, mercurial ointment, tincture of iodine, and a lotion of hyposulphite of soda (1 in 12) were severally used, and after about three weeks the skin was almost clean. Some weeks afterwards, the eruption re-appeared on the forearms in the form of the characteristic small circumscribed patches of body-ringworm. The local remedy, which I found most rapid in its effect as a parasiticide in the treatment of this case, was the tincture of iodine of which two applications completely removed the disease from the fore-arms. The lotion of the hyposulphite of soda and the mercurial ointment had apparently but little influence on the disease. The sulphur ointment, however, had a gradual curative action. To many of the vessels which leave Queensland and Fiji to recruit labour in the Solomon and New Hebrides groups, sulphur ointment is supplied; and the government-agents are instructed to use it in all cases of this disease amongst the natives recruited. I learned from some of these gentlemen that, when the remedy is applied thoroughly, and under superintendence, they usually succeed in thoroughly cleansing the skin from the eruption before the ships return to the colonies.