378 MOSQUITOES OF NORTH AMERICA 



the mosquitoes are dead. The box is taken to the verandah and opened there 

 till the fumes of benzene escape.'^ 



In this way Mr. Lefroy caught 2336 mosquitoes in thirty-one days, a daily 

 average of 83.75 ; daily average of females 22.68. At the same time 23 of the 

 biting sand flies of the genus Ceratopogon were caught. He further states that 

 whereas the inmates were before disturbed with mosquitoes and sand flies, which 

 especially attacked the baby, the pest practically entirely ceased. All of the mos- 

 quitoes were not exterminated, but so large a portion were destroyed that the 

 inmates of the house suffered no more. Mr. Lefroy goes on to say : " I am not 

 prepared to recommend this as a universal remedy. It must be sensibly used ; a 

 small amount of personal effort in teaching a servant is necessary at first. But 

 where mosquitoes are a plague, especially to little children, the housekeeper's 

 thirst for the blood of the mosquito may rise to so great a pitch that she will 

 welcome this device and take a delight (as we do) in counting the corpses 

 daily." 



The idea of Mr. Maxwell-Lefroy's apparatus was probably first announced 

 by Nuttall and Shipley (Journal of Hygiene, January, 1902, vol. 2, p. 73) in 

 the following words : 



" We are moreover inclined to believe that suitably constructed coloured boxes 

 or colour-traps might be of practical utility in and about houses infested with 

 mosquitoes. By periodically closing the boxes and sweeping out the contained 

 insects into a receptacle, or, possibly by rendering the interior of the boxes 

 sticky, a considerable number of mosquitoes might be destroyed." 



This idea was gained by Nuttall and Shipley in the course of their experiments 

 with boxes of different colors to ascertain the color most attractive to Anopheles 

 mosquitoes. 



G. Blin (Bull. Soc. de Pathol. Exotique, vol. 1, pp. 100-103, 1908) records 

 certain experiments made in Dahomey, in 1905, with trap-holes (trous-pieges). 

 His procedure consisted in digging in the ground, near houses infested by mos- 

 quitoes, oblique holes where the mosquitoes would come to seek darkness and 

 protection from the heat. Then, during the day the mosquitoes were destroyed 

 with a little improvised kerosene-torch, such as a wisp of straw or a stick soaked 

 in kerosene. 



Doctor Kiilz (Archiv fiir Schiffs- und Tropen-hygiene, 1909, v. 13, p. 645) 

 states that these experiments of Blin were the first trap-box or trap-hole experi- 

 ments, evidently overlooking the earlier work of Nuttall and Shipley. 



An interesting home-made apparatus in common use in many parts of the 

 United States is very convenient and effective. It consists of a tin cup, or of a 

 can cover, nailed to the end of a long stick in such a way that a spoonful or so 

 of kerosene can be placed in the cup which may then, by means of the stick, be 

 pressed up to the ceiling so as to enclose one mosquito after another. When 

 pressed up in this way the captured mosquito will attempt to fly and be caught 

 in the kerosene. By this method perhaps the majority of the mosquitoes in a 

 given bedroom, certainly all those resting on the ceiling, can be caught before 

 one goes to bed. 



