202 NATURAL SCIENCE. m^^, 



weighing the same number of the same species and sex fully fed ; and 

 it is startling to learn that the fed specimens weighed more than a 

 hundred times as much as the unfed. 



The power of enormous feeding at one time is accompanied, as 

 is often the case, by extraordinary powers of fasting at other times. 

 It has been lately observed by Dr. Strachan, in Jamaica, that young 

 Ixodes bred in confinement can live for months without food, and he 

 is inclined to attribute it to their being born with a food-supply ; 

 but the knowledge of their abihty to live for long periods without 

 food is not by any means new, nor is this capacity confined to 

 the young. Probably it is carried to the greatest extent in the 

 Argasinae, a sub-family of the Ixodidae and clearly belonging to 

 them, although formerly, in an unaccountable manner, included in 

 the Gamasidae by some authors. Some years ago, some dead Acarids 

 were sent to me from Adelaide, Australia, and these proved to be not 

 distinguishable from the well-known Argas persims. As this was an 

 interesting fact, I wrote to enquire if my correspondent could forward 

 some alive, and two or three were accordingly sent ; but they were 

 put loosely in a tin box, without food or packing of any kind, nothing 

 in the box except the mites, and in this state they came by post. I 

 was away when they arrived, but on my return, some two months 

 afterwards, I found them all alive. Moreover, numerous young ones 

 had been born, either during the journey or after it, and these also 

 were living. The best instance, however, is that related by 

 MM. Laboulbene and Megnin. Some time between i860 and 1870, 

 the Shah of Persia engaged the services of a French physician, 

 Dr. Tholozan, who was a friend of Laboulbene, and was asked by 

 him to examine into the stories concerning the Persian Argas, and to 

 send home specimens. In June, 1877, '^he creatures were sent alive, but 

 without food, packed in cotton-wool, in a box, and wrapped up in paper. 

 Laboulbene sent the box to Megnin, who mislaid it ; just four years 

 afterwards, the box was found and opened. The males had died ; 

 the females had had numerous young, which had died ; but the 

 females themselves were living, and ready to feed when they got the 

 chance. 



This species affords an example of what I said before, 

 namely, that the bite may possibly produce much worse results in a 

 hot country than in England ; it was originally described by Fischer, 

 of Waldheim, in 1809, under the name of Argas persicus, and he 

 speaks of it as much feared and very dangerous, even destroying life. 

 About ten years later, Maurice Kotzebue, who uses as a popular 

 name " Punaise de Miana," but identifies it with Fischer's Argas, 

 gives a terrible account of the creature, saying that its bite produced 

 high fevers, convulsions, delirium, and finally death in twenty-four 

 hours. 



Tholozan was not certain whether there was truth in these 

 stories ; he found that at Chahroud-Bastam the creatures had a very 



