80 



KNOWLEDGE 



[April 2, 1894. 



Fig. 8 —Nobis 

 rtmhotus. Magni- 

 fied two and a half 

 diameters. 



common as Notomctu, and as it lurks amongst pond weeds, 

 is rarely seen except when taken in a net ; it appears, 

 therefore, to have no popular name, but is scientifically 

 known as Naucon's ciinicoidi's. Its behaviour is much 

 the same as that of Xotonecta, save that it swims back 

 uppermost, and the pain of its prick is at least as acute, 

 if not more so, and hence most persons would instinc- 

 tively di-op it as soon as they felt the prick, under the 

 impression that a real sting had been received. 



The only terrestrial species of Hemiptera that has been 

 found to give a painful prick with its beak is a very common 

 insect found amongst low herbage, such as tufts of grass, 

 rushes, stinging-nettles, &c. It is called Xahis limbatus 

 (Fig. 8), and is a long, narrow, brownish insect, with long, 

 slender legs, and rudimentary wings. 

 The female has the body considerably 

 dilated, and marked above with pale 

 orange stripes, which contrast prettily 

 with the more sober colouring of the other 

 parts. Like the other members of its 

 genus, it is active and predaceous, feeding 

 on the juices of other insects. Only one 

 instance has been recorded of its attacking 

 man, and that was under the most excep- 

 tional conditions, when the equanimity 

 of any insect might be expected to be 

 disturbed. In 1889, Mr. Eardley-Mason 

 wrote as follows to the Entomologist's 

 Monthly Mai/nzine: — •" On 1st Heptember 

 last, feeling a sharp sting on my neck, 

 I hastily put up my hand to catch the offender, when, 

 instead of a wasp, it proved to be a Nahis limhritus. The 

 sensation was precisely that of a wasp's sting, and the 

 appearance also. The swelling, however, was not nearly 

 so great, and in two hours both it and the irritation had 

 subsided. The insect, I imagine, had been trapped between 

 my neck and shirt collar, and had resorted to its rostrum 

 as a weapon of defence." Such an experience is cer- 

 tainly very rare, and I have myself handled hmidreds 

 of these insects without ever having been stung. It 

 was no doubt the awkward position in which the insect 

 found itself that led it to behave in such an unprecedented 

 way. 



Our final group of stinging insects consists of caterpillars 

 with glandular hairs, such as those of the brown tail and 

 gold tail moths, and the processionary moths of the Con- 

 tinent. As we have already described in detail the powers 

 of these insects in the recent articles on caterpillars, it will 

 be imnecessary to enlarge upon the subject here, and we 

 need only remind our readers that these stings of the 

 fourth class are the only ones that are, as it were, 

 accidental, and independent of the will of the insect, being 

 brought about by the mere contact of an external body 

 with the hairs. Nevertheless, in result they are as 

 painful as the bites and stings already referred to, and 

 give rise to even greater irritation. These are the only 

 group, too, in which the effect may be produced without 

 actual contact with the insect itself; merely holding the 

 head over a box containing the caterpillars is sometimes 

 sufficient to produce considerable swellings and much 

 irritation, no doubt because of fragments of the hairs 

 tioating about in the atmosphere. 



A word may be added with reference to the accompany- 

 ing plate. The figure of the gadfly, magnified about three 

 and a half diameters, will speak for itself, as we have 

 described it above. The flattened body, the pale margins 

 of the segments, expanding in the middle into pale 

 triangles, and the forked antenmi?, will serve to distinguish 

 it from other two-winged fljes. This insect, it will be 



remembered, carries its weapons around its mouth. The 

 three bees, typical of insects whose weapon is in the tail, 

 represent the " sexes " of the hive bee {Apis mellijica), 

 magnified about one and a half diameters. The bulky 

 body, meeting eyes, and longer antenna^ and wings, at 

 once distinguish the drone or male bee. The queen being 

 monandrous, and one impregnation lasting her lifetime, 

 only one drone is really required for each queen, so that 

 the annual production of drones is far in excess of actual 

 requirements ; and as the queen is caught by her partner 

 in the air, the successful suitor is likely to be one of the 

 finest of the brood, and thus the quality of the breed is 

 maintained. Under ordinary circumstances the drones 

 are of course stingless, but since hermaphroditism occa- 

 sionally occurs amongst bees as amongst other insects, 

 drones with sting and poison gland complete may be met 

 with — in fact, various admixtures of the sexual peculiarities 

 occur, such as specimens with drone abdomen and thorax 

 and worker head, and the converse ; or, more remarkable 

 still, with drone abdomen and thorax and one half of the 

 head worker and the other half drone, as well as the 

 converse of this. 



THE GREAT SANITARY LESSON OF THE 

 CRIMEAN WAR. 



By G. B. LoNGSTAFF, M.A., M.D.Oxon., F.R.C.P., &c. 



WAR is a great CNil, some would go so far as to 

 say the greatest of all evils ; but, bad as it is, 

 horrible as it is, we owe many good things to 

 war, some that few dream of. 



It is now forty years since the armies of 

 France and England pitched their camps on the plateau 

 before Sebastopol. The winter of 1851-5 caused unspeak- 

 able sufferings to many thousands of brave men. Did they 

 suffer in vain ? By no means, but it is quite certain that 

 very few people know in what way we to-day are benefiting 

 from the hardships they endured in those terrible days. 



I will quote from one who was there, who studied the 

 object-lesson deeply, who barely escaped with his life, 

 but who lived long after to give to his countrymen in a 

 most practical form the results of his painful studies. 

 •J. Netten Radcliffe, late Medical Inspector of the Local 

 Government Board, wrote : "The Crimean war was one 

 of the most important agencies concerned in the develop- 

 ment of sound sanitary method and practice in this 

 country " ; and he went on to say that its sanitary lessons 

 constitute, probably, the most important legacy left to the 

 nation by that war.''= 



" The great catastrophe which befell the British army 

 in the Crimea during the winter of 1854-5 was no novelty 

 in our military history, but it occurred under circumstances 

 very different from any that had ever before presented 

 themselves in the wars waged by this country. It 

 occurred at a time when the country had been thoroughly 

 aroused [especially by the cholera epidemic of 1819] to a 

 sense of the supreme importance of the health of the 

 population as affecting the welfare of the nation, and was 

 prepared to take an intelligent interest in all questions 

 relating to the subject. It occurred also under circum- 

 stances of publicity such as had never attached to an army in 



the field before Then England learnt for the first 



time how strangely it had misapprehended the requirements 

 of the soldier. By the electric telegraph, the facility of 



* " Sanitary Fundamentals." Two lectures deliTered at the Royal 

 Naval College bv J Netten Radeliffc, afterward" published in The 

 Practitioner. 



