126 OBSERVATIONS ON THE LIFE H1ST(JRY, ETC. 



small and so delicate that they break up easily when disturbed. 

 I have spent much time and labour in trying to detach them in a 

 perfect condition from the surrounding parts. I have some 

 specimens, but not sufHciently complete and well displayed to 

 form a good picture. Taking the finest sewing needles for 

 dissecting instruments, the parts upon which they are used are 

 so minute, that I can fitly compare the work to that of a 

 surgeon who would use a couple of crow-bars to dissect out the 

 glands of a man's neck. Our fingers are so clumsy, that in 99 

 cases out of an 100, so much mischief is done to the parts, that the 

 operation is useless. They resemble three irregularly shaped 

 sausages connected at the upper parts. The middle gland in 

 each set differs slightly from the others, and it is supposed to be the 

 chemical laboratory where the poison is made. Its two neigh- 

 bours are thought to be salivary glands. But the secretions 

 from the three mingle in the tube from which they all hang. 

 This tube ascends to the lower part of the mosquitoe's neck, 

 where it joins the one leading from the other set of glands. 

 The two thence unite and become a larger tube, traversing the 

 neck and head to empty their contents into the largest lancets at 

 the base of the probos is. Thence the mixed poison and salivary 

 secretions are injected into the punctured skin of the victim. I 

 have here in fig. 11a dissection of the pumping apparatus, so that 

 you may see this interesting bit of the insects economy. This is a 

 complete one, and resembles the bulb of an india-rubber enema. 

 It is connected there to the base of the lancets, the brain and 

 other portions of the head being cut away. The tube leading to 

 the stomach is connected to the end that is now free. I am not 

 quite satisfied about its mode of working. My first conjecture 

 was that it worked like an elastic enema. The alternate com- 

 pression and relaxation of its walls pumping up the blood into 

 the stomach. But one night, when racking up the condenser to 

 wet a better illumination on the focussing glass of the camera, I 

 accidently forced the slide against the nose of a high-power 

 object glass. The result was just what happened when Mary 

 Jane drops ihe milk jug on the cement kitchen Hoor — the pump 

 was broken into fragments, and the pieces lay on the slide. My 

 newly-forni" >i tlieory that this bulb might be a muscular bag, 

 like the heart, was shattered too by this accident, for its walls 

 were as hard and brittle as china. I find it is separable into 

 four longituuinal sections. There is traceable on the edges of the 



