304 TRAVELS IN THE CONFEDERATION 



give out a dark purple-red liquid. Among the many 

 nettles (Medusa) there was remarked one variety 

 green, and several rose-colored. 



Unfortunately we could not lay hands on glasses 

 here or any other suitable vessels in which to preserve 

 such creatures for more careful examination ; nor at the 

 time could any paper be had in Providence for putting 

 up plants. 



Among insects the Chiggers (Pulex penetrans L.) 

 are no small plague to the inhabitants here. These are 

 not confined to the Bahamas, but are spread over all 

 the West India islands and the warmer parts of North 

 America as far as Carolina and even Virginia. This 

 vexatious animalcule lives in the sand and the floors of 

 dwelling-houses. It is difficult to avoid its lodgment in 

 the skin. It attacks oftenest the soles of the feet, and 

 other parts of the lower limbs, but does not spare 

 the rest of the body. One is scarcely aware of the 

 first approach, but after a short time the troublesome 

 guest declares itself by a very disagreeable itching, 

 and at the spot where the chigger is, there is a little 

 rise of the skin, of the same color with it and at first 

 hardly perceptible, in the middle of which is a small 

 brown point denoting the site of the beast. Once quite 

 burrowed beneath the skin, it begins forthwith to lay 

 its eggs, which are enclosed in a peculiar white case; 

 the chigger is then found with the hinder part of its 

 body in this egg-sack, only the head, proboscis, and a 

 few fore-feet protruding, but the whole quite covered 

 by the skin. Such an egg-sack, partly from the num- 

 ber of eggs laid in it, partly from the increase of the 

 hatched brood, may grow to the size of a pea and 

 cause violent pain. If through carelessness, sloth, 



