SOME ANNOYING PESTS OF MAN 339 



benefit of the smoke. He fought the gnats until near 

 night before he could make any one hear. He was finally 

 rescued, however, but died before morning. The narrator 

 says, " There is no doubt but that the buffalo-gnats killed 

 him." 



The effect upon man of the species especially obnoxious 

 in the northern woods has never proved to be so serious, 

 yet their bites are severe, as any one familiar with them 

 can attest. Packard describes these pests so well, as he 

 found them along the Labrador Coast, that he is worth 

 quoting in full. "The black-fly is even a more formidable 

 pest than the mosquito. In the northern subarctic regions, 

 it opposes a barrier against travel. The Labrador fisher- 

 man spends his summer on the sea shore, scarcely daring to 

 penetrate the interior on account of the swarms of these 

 flies. During a summer residence on this coast, we sailed 

 up the Esquimaux River for six or eight miles, spending a 

 few hours at a house situated on the bank. The day was 

 warm and but little wind blowing, and the swarms of 

 black-flies were absolutely terrific. In vain we frantically 

 waved our net among them, allured by some rare moth ; 

 after making a few desperate charges in the face of the 

 thronging pests, we had to retire to the house, where the 

 windows actually swarmed with them ; but here they 

 would fly in our faces, crawl under one's clothes, where 

 they even remain and bite in the night. The children in 

 the house were sickly and worn by their unceasing tor- 

 ments ; and the shaggy Newfoundland dogs, whose thick 

 coats would seem to be proof against their bites, ran from 

 their shelter beneath the bench and dashed into the river, 

 their only retreat. In cloudy weather, unlike the mos- 

 quito, the black-fly disappears, only flying when the sun 



