DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 91 



tions Abinzoar, called also Avenzoar, a celebrated His- 

 pano -Arabian physician of Seville, who flourished in the 

 twelfth century, as the most ancient author that notices 

 it. He calls these mites little lice that creep under the 

 skin of the hands, legs, and feet, exciting pustules full of 

 fluid ^. Joubert, quoted by the same author, describes 

 them under the name of Siro7ies, as always being con- 

 cealed beneath the epidermis, under which they creep 

 like moles, gnawing it, and causing a most troublesome 

 itching. It appears that Mouffet, or whoever was the 

 author of that part of the T/iealnim Insectorum, was him- 

 self also well acquainted with these animals, since he re- 

 marks that their habitation is not in the pustule but near 

 it : a remark afterwards confirmed by Linne'', and more 

 recently by Dr. Adams ^. In common with the former 

 of these authors, Mouffet further notices the effect of 

 warmth upon them in exciting motion'*. Our intelligent 

 countryman also observes that they cannot be Pediculi, 

 since they live under the cuticle, which lice never do*^. 

 In the epistle dedicatory, the editor speaks also of them 

 as living in burrows which they have excavated in the 

 skin near a lake of water ; from which if they be ex- 

 tracted with a needle and put upon the nail, they show 

 in the sun their red head and the feet with which they 



^ Mouffet, 2G6. 



'' Acarus sub ipsa pustnla minhne quaerendus est, sed longius re- 

 cessit, sequendo rugam cuticulse observatur. Amaen, Ac. v. 95. not. **. 



■^ Observations, &c. 296. 



^ Extractus acu et super ungue positus, movet se si solis etiam ca- 

 lore adjuvetur. ubisiq))'. Ungui iinpositus vix movetur: si vero oris 

 calido halitu affletur, agilis in ungue cursitat. Fn. Succ. 1975. 



"^ Neque Syrones isti sunt de i)ediculorum genere, ut Johannes 

 Langius ex Aristotcle vidctur asserere : nam illi extra cutem vivunt, 

 hi vero non. xibi siqjv. 



