482 OTHER BLOOD-SUCKING FLIES 



of blackflies as he encountered them in Canada. From ac- 

 counts of other authors they must be equally terrible in other 

 places. King, for instance, states that in parts of Sudan (Don- 

 gola) a species known as the nimetti, Simulium griseicollis, 

 renders life a burden during the winter months. The famous 

 Columbacz fly, S. columbaczense, of southern Europe is said to 

 be a terrible pest, and there are instances of children having been 

 killed by it. My own experiences occurred in the woods of 

 Northern Ontario early in June. Upon arriving there I did not 

 recognize Dr. Munford of Cornell University, with whom I 

 had been quite intimate, until he spoke. He had been in the 

 region about a fortnight. His face, neck and arms were so swol- 

 len from blackfly bites as to completely alter his appearance. 

 The wrists were swollen until no constriction between hand and 

 forearm was present. That evening, having been told of the 

 manner in which deer came and stood in the water near the 

 outlet of the lake, a mile or so from camp, I went in a canoe to 

 watch them, being warned to tie my trouser legs tightly around 

 my shoes and my coat sleeves to my gloves, and to fit a veil 

 stretched from a broad-brimmed hat tightly around my neck. 

 No repellents were at hand. With some impatience (having been 

 bred among the mosquitoes of New Jersey) I submitted to these 

 precautions, though I was careless in carrying them out, and 

 made the trip to the outlet which is an old log chute, and the 

 breeding place of the flies. In spite of the precautions taken, 

 the blackflies, alighting on the veil in such numbers as to make 

 it difficult to see through it, managed to find vulnerable spots 

 in my armor. Unlike mosquitoes they alight and crawl; they 

 found their way up under the veil, between the buttons of shirt 

 and trousers, and through the cords at my wrists. In a few 

 minutes I was driven almost frantic and could hardly restrain 

 myself from diving into the lake to avoid the attacking flies, as 

 did the deer. Each bite, and before I got to the safe haven of a 

 dense smudge at camp I had hundreds of them, was only slightly 

 painful; the flies drilled a tiny hole which bled a drop or two, so 

 that the attacked parts of the body became completely smeared 

 with blood. But this was not the end. The bites next morning 

 were swollen, and itched somewhat; the swelling and irritation 

 grew constantly worse until the third night, when each bite 

 became the site of an oozing pimple. By this time the itching 



