66 THE FLEA [CH. 



clothing covered with myriads of fleas, sometimes 

 ravenous, and at others weak from long fasting. 



The human flea is a good deal more select in the 

 choice of a host than some other species. The cat- 

 flea (Ctenocephalus felis) has been found not only 

 on the cat, but also on the dog, tiger, leopard, goat, 

 horse, rat, hedgehog, kangaroo, deer, guinea-pig, 

 rabbit, and on man. Many of these were specimens 

 collected in zoological gardens. Although when 

 hungry and confined in a test-tube the human flea 

 will readily bite a rat or a guinea-pig, it has been 

 found that human fleas kept with no other food- 

 supply than rats and guinea-pigs soon die off. 



When large numbers of human fleas were wanted 

 for experiments in Bombay, guinea-pigs were used as 

 traps to attract them. On one occasion two guinea- 

 pigs placed in a house which had been vacant for 

 some days, and in which fleas must have been short 

 of food, failed to attract any of this species ; while a 

 man who entered the house shortly afterwards acted 

 as an admirable trap. Those who have not had 

 experience of the abundance and voracity of fleas 

 in oriental countries can hardly believe the numbers 

 of human fleas that may be captured by sending a 

 bare-legged man into a deserted house and then 

 picking the fleas off him. In one house 31 P. irritans 

 were taken on a man's legs in a few minutes. 

 In another house 84 P. irritans, 8 cat-fleas and 



