18 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM Vol, 68 



Lenf^th, 3.00 mm. ; width, 1.05 mm. 



Type host and type locality. — African ne^jro, in Africa ( ? ) . 



Tliis description is based on females and males collected from 

 negroes in Africa by H. C. Raven of the Smithsonian-Universal 

 African Expedition of 1919-1920. Of the American specimens of 

 Pediculus examined by the writer those of a lot taken by R. H. 

 Hutchinson at New Orleans, Louisiana, May 1, 1918, should be re- 

 ferred to this variety. I find them almost identical with the material 

 taken from negroes in Africa. Most of the body lice found in 

 North America appear to be impure races or h3^brids. 



PEDICULUS (PEDICULUS) HUMANUS CORPORUS De Geer 



1758 Pediculus humanus Linnaeus (part), Syst. Nat., ert. 10, p. GIO, 



1766 Pediculus humanus, variety 2 Linnaeus, Syst. Nat., ed. 12, vol. 2, 



p. 1016. 

 1778 Pediculus humanus, variety corporis De Geer, Mem. Hist. Ins., vol. 7, 



p. 67, pi. I, fig. 7. 

 ISIS Pediculus vcstiineuti Nitzsch, Germar's Mag., vol. 3, p. .305. 

 1842 Pediculus vestimoiti Denny, Mon. Anop., p. 16, pi. 26, fig. 1. 

 1874 Pediculus vestinienti Giebel, Ins. Epizoa, p. 27, pi. 1, fig. 5. 

 1880 Pediculus vestime^iti Piaget, Les Ped., p. 623, pi. 50, fig. 3. 

 11)08 Pediculus corporis Dalla Torre, Gen. Ins., Anop., p. 8. 



1910 Pediculus vestinienti Mjuberg. Ark. f. ZooL, vol. 6, no. 13, p. 168. 



1911 Pediculus capitis, variety vestinienti Neumann, Arch, de Par., vol. 14, 



p. 41L 



1912 Pediculus corporis Faiirenholz, 2-3^th Jahresb. d. Niedersiich. 



Zool. Ver., p. 2. fig. 2, pi. 3. figs. 1-2. 



1913 Pediculus corporis Fahrenholz, Zool. Anz.. vol. 41, p. 373. 



1916 Pediculus corporis Ferris, Proe. Cal. Acad. Sci., ser. 4, vol. 6, p. 137. 



1917 Pediculus humanus (vestinienti) Bacot, Parasitology, vol. 9, p. 255. 



1919 Pediculus humanus, race corporis Nuttall, I'arasitology, vol. 11, p. 



334. 



1920 Pediculus humanus, race corporis Nuttall (part). Parasitology, voL 



12, p. 15L 



No attempt is here made to describe the body louse of Europe or 

 of the Caucasian race. Up to the present the writer has been unable 

 to get material which could be considered as truly representative of 

 the form described by Linnaeus and by De Geer and other early 

 entomologists. Indeed, if such forms were available for study there 

 would probably be but little assurance that they were free from 

 hybridization. That the ancient Mediterranean i:)eoples had con- 

 tacts with negroes and, in the case of the Egyptians, had many 

 negro slaves is well Imown. Theoretically, at least, there should have 

 been no reason why the body louse of the negro should not have 

 spread to the Hebrews, Greeks, Phoenicians, and others. 



De Geer (1778) figures his P. humanus corporis as being very 

 much like his P. humanus capitis., so much so in fact that one is in- 

 clined to wonder if he really had the typical European body louse 

 or one of the hybrids from the head louse of that continent. A 



