MOSQUITOES IN GENERAL 47 



the coagulation of all proteids and so promote the pro- 

 cess of siiction. 



The amount of irritation caused by the poison of mos- 

 quitoes varies g-reatly with different individuals. Some 

 people suffer severely from their bites, while others are not 

 at all affected. This is a matter of common observation. 

 I have seen a man hunting snipe in a marsh with his face 

 protected, but with his neck left exposed. His neck had 

 been repeatedly bitten and was so poisoned as to utterly 

 destroy its symmetry. At the end of the day he no longer 

 possessed a neck, but from his shoulders to his head was 

 simply a gradual slope ! 



There can be little doubt that people become inoculated 

 against this poison. Persons living in mosquito-ridden 

 localities as a rule suffer less than those who come there 

 from more favored regions, and it seems likely that after 

 a severe case of mosquito-poisoning the inoculating effect 

 may last for a long while. An instance of this has been 

 sent me by the Rev. Edward Everett Hale, who wrote, 

 under date of August 29, 1900 : 



" I think I am an instance of inoculation by mosquitoes' 

 virus. More than fifty years ago I went into the Maine 

 woods going to Katahdin. The first afternoon we were 

 out hardly an hour, but at night, when we went into 

 camp, I counted sixty well defined mosquito bites on my 

 right hand alone. Now from that time to this I have 

 hardly been troubled by mosquitoes. I dislike their song 

 at night, and if I saw one on my hand I should kill it, but 

 after the moment of the sting I never renu^mber that I 

 have been bitten." 



