10G NATURAL HISTORY 



For a long time I have desired my relation to look out 

 for these birds in Andalusia; and now he writes me word 

 that, for the first time, he saw one dead in the market on 

 the 3rd of September. 1 



When the (Edicnemus flies it stretches out its legs 

 straight behind, like a heron. 



LETTER XXXIV. 



TO THOMAS PESNANT, ESQUIRE. 



SELBOENE, March 30, 1771. 



f/Tra E=Si? HERB is an insect with us, especially on 

 chalky districts, which is very troublesome 

 and teasing all the latter end of the summer, 

 getting into people's skins, especially those 

 of women and children, and raising tumours 

 which itch intolerably. This animal (which we call a har- 

 vest bug) is very minute, scarce discernible to the naked 

 eye, of a bright scarlet colour, and of the genus of Acarus. 

 They are to be met with in gardens on kidney beans, or any 

 legumens, but prevail only in the hot months of summer. 

 Warreners, as some have assured me, are much infested by 

 them on chalky downs ; where these insects swarm some- 

 times to so infinite a degree as to discolour their nets, and 

 to give them a reddish cast, while the men are so bitten as 

 to be thrown into fevers. 



There is a small long shining fly in these parts very 

 troublesome to the housewife by getting into the chimneys 

 and laying its eggs in the bacon while it is drying. These 

 eggs produce maggots called jumpers, which, harbouring in 

 the gammons and best parts of the hogs, eat down to the 



1 Mr. Howard Saunders, in his " List of the Birds of Southern Spain" 

 (Ibis, 1871, p. 386), includes the stone curlew as " common and resident, 

 frequenting dry watercourses, and the most arid plains, where it deposits 

 its eggs." ED. 



