Chap. I.] 



MOSQUITOES. 



115 



ill wliicli rambiitans \ custard apples 2, and country 

 almonds ^, were the most agreeable novelties. The 

 only di^awbacks to enjoyment were the heat and 

 the mosquitoes ; and from either it was hopeless 

 to escape. Next to the torture and apprehension 

 it inflicts, the most annoying pecuharities of the 

 mosquito are the booming hum of its approach, its 

 cunning, its audacity, and the perseverance with which 

 it renews its attacks however ft-equently repulsed ; and 

 these characteristics are so remarkable as fully to justify 

 the conjectm^e that the mosquito, and not the ordinary 

 fly, constituted the plague inflicted upon Pharaoh and 

 the Egyptians.^ 



^ This delicious fi-uit, which is a 

 species of Neplielium, takes its name 

 from the Malay word ramhut, " the 

 hair of the head," which describes 

 the villose coverinfif that envelopes it. 

 ^ Anana reticulata. 

 ^ From the Terminalia Catappa ; 

 called Kath-hadam in Bengal. The 

 tree is exotic ; and was probably in- 

 troduced into Ceylon from Java. — 

 See Buchanan's 6'urvei/ of Behur, 

 vol. i. p. 233. 



^ The precise species of insect by 

 means of which the Almighty sig- 

 nalised the plague of flies, remains 

 uncertain, as the Hebrew term aroh 

 or orov, which has been rendered in 

 one place, " Divers sorts of flies," 

 Ps. cv. 31 ; and in another, "swarms 

 of flies," Exod. viii. 21, &c., means 

 merely " an assemblage," a " mixtm-e," 

 or a ** swann," and the expletive '' of 

 files " is an interpolation of the trans- 

 lators. This, however, serves to 

 show that the fly implied was one 

 easily recognisal^le by its habit of 

 sxoarming; and the further fact that 

 it hites, or rather stings, is elicited 

 from the expression of the Psalmist, 

 Ps. Ixxviii. 4-5, that the insects by 

 which the Egy]3tians were tonnented 

 " devoured thorn/' so that here are 

 two peculiarities inapplicable to the 

 domestic fly, but strongly character- 

 istic of gnats and mosquitoes. 



Bruce thought that the fly of the 

 fourth plague was the ^'zimb" of 

 Abyssinia which he so gi-aphically 

 describes; and Wkstwood, in an 

 ingenious passage in his Entomolo- 

 f/ist's Te.ii-book, p. 17, combats the 

 strange idea of one of the bishops, 

 that it was a cockroach ! and argues 

 in favour of the mosquito. Tliis view 

 he sustains by a reference to the 

 liabits of the creature, the swarms iu 

 which it in\-ades a locality, and the 

 audacity with which it enters the 

 houses ; and he accounts for the 

 exemption of " the land of Goshen 

 iu which the Israelites dwelt," by 

 the fact of its being sandy pasture 

 above the level of the river ; whilst 

 the mosquitoes were produced freely 

 in the rest of Eg;<t-pt, the soil of which 

 was submerged bv the rising of the 

 Nile. 



In all the passages in the Old 

 Testament in which flies are alluded 

 to, otherwise than in connection with 

 the Egyptian infliction, the word 

 used in the Hebrew is zevov, whicli 

 the Septuagint renders by the ordi- 

 nary generic term for flies In general, 

 i)rh(, " musca " (Eccles. x. 1, Isaiah 

 vii. 10); but in every instance in 

 wliich mention is made of the miracle 

 of Moses, the Septuagint says that 

 the fly produced was the Kvyo/trla, 

 the " dog-flv." What insect was 



