The  hookworm  is  troublesome  chiefly  in  the  rural  districts.  The
poor  of  the  cities,  who  are  bread  eaters,  have  sprue  instead.  Of  late
only  certified  yeast  from  the  United  States  has  been  permitted  on  the
island ;  moreover,  sprue  may  be  cured  by  vaccination.  A  more  serious
thing  is  the  prevalence  of  "  t.  b."  —  which  missionaries  on  the  island
dub  "  tin  box."  Since  the  Americans  came,  there  has  been  a  constant
increase  in  zinc  roofs  and  sheet-iron  houses  over  the  old  open-as- wool
thatch  hovels,  and  as  the  countryman  persists  in  closing  by  night  even
the  single  tiny  window,  like  that  in  the  end  of  a  box-car,  up  under  the
eaves  of  his  shacks,  weak  lungs  are  increasing.
298          ROAMING  THROUGH  THE  WEST  INDIES

Fruit  is  abundant  along  the  roads  of  Porto  Rico.  Mere  bananas
are  so  plentiful  that  they  are  often  abandoned  to  the  goats  and  pigs;
in  Lares  a  man  with  a  wheelbarrow  full  of  them  was  selling  the  largest
and  best  at  seven  cents  a  dozen.  Wild  oranges,  sweet,  and  juicy,  for
all  their  seeds,  line  the  highways  in  what  seems  quan''ty  sufficient  to
supply  the  entire  demands  of  the  "  Mainland."  Most  of  them  never
reach  the  market.  Here  and  there  one  runs  across  a  crude  packing-
house among  the  hills,  but  the  fact  that  a  box  containing  an  average
of  one  hundred  and  fifty  oranges,  picked,  sorted,  crated,  and  hauled  to
the  coast,  sells  for  fifty  cents  answers  the  natural  query.  In  the  trade
these  are  known  as  "  east-side  oranges,"  and  are  generally  sold  by
pushcart  men  in.  the  tenement  districts  of  our  large  cities  —  at  how
many  hundred  per  cent,  increase  in  price  purchasers  may  figure  out  for
themselves.
