60 DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



think that the cathedral was on fire. A similar occurrence, in like manner 

 giving rise to an alarm of the church being on fire, took place in July 1812 

 at Sagan in Silesia. 1 In the following year at Norwich, in May, at about 

 six o'clock in the evening, the inhabitants of that city were alarmed by the 

 appearance of smoke issuing from the upper window of the spire of the 

 cathedral, for which at the time no satisfactory account could be given, but 

 which was most probably produced by the same cause. And in the year 

 1766, in the month of August, they appeared in such incredible numbers 

 at Oxford as to resemble a black cloud, darkening the air, and almost 

 totally intercepting the beams of the sun. One day, a little before sunset, 

 six columns of them were observed to ascend from the boughs of an apple- 

 tree, some in a perpendicular and others in an oblique direction, to the 

 height of fifty or sixty feet. Their bite was so envenomed, that it was 

 attended by violent and alarming inflammation : and one when killed usually 

 contained as much blood as would cover three or four square inches of 

 wall. 2 Our great poet Spenser seems to have witnessed a similar appear- 

 ance of them, which furnished him with the following beautiful simile: 



," As when a swarme of gnats at eventide 



Out of the fennes of Allan doe arise, 



Their murmuring small trumpets sownden wide, 



Whiles in the air their clnst'ring army flies, 

 >- That as a cloud, doth seem to dim the skies : 



Ne man nor beast may rest or take repast 



For their sharp wounds and noyous injuries. 



Till the fierce northern wind with blust'ring blast 

 Doth blow them quite away, and in the ocean cast." 



In Marshland in Norfolk, as I learn from a lady who had an opportunity 

 of personal inspection, the inhabitants are so annoyed by the gnats, that 

 the better sort of them, as in many hot climates, have recourse to a gauze 

 covering for their beds, to keep them off during the night. Whether this 

 practice obtains in other fen districts I do not know. 3 



But these evils are of small account compared with what other countries, 

 especially when we approach the poles or the line, are destined to suffer 

 from them : for there they interfere so much with ease and comfort, as to 

 become one of the worst of pests and a real misery of human life. We 

 may be disposed to smile perhaps at the story Mr. Weld relates from 

 General Washington, that in one place the musquitos were so powerful as 

 to pierce through his boots 4 (probably they crept within the boots) : but 

 in various regions scarcely any thing less impenetrable than leather can 

 withstand their insinuating weapons and unwearied attacks. One would 

 at first imagine that regions where the polar winter extends its icy reign 

 would not be much annoyed by insects : but however probable the suppo- 

 sition, it is the reverse of fact, for nowhere are gnats more numerous. 

 These animals, as well as numbers of the Tipularics of Latreille, seem en- 



1 Germar's Magazin de Entomologie, i. 137. 



Philos. Trans. 1767, 111. 113. I once witnessed a similar appearance at Maid- 

 stone in Kent. 



5 A small British species of Ceratapogon (one of the midge family of Tipulidai) is 

 occasionally very troublesome by settling upon the uncovered parts of the body and 

 sucking the blood. 



* Weld's Travels, 8vo. edit. 205. Yet Mouffet affirms the same : " Morsu crudelea 

 et venenati, triplices caligas, imo ocreas, item perforantes." 81 



