GirLIES.— Notes on some Changes in the Fauna of Otago. 9811 
not escape so easily, and dire tales of unrest and suffering were constantly 
recounted by hapless wights who had to spend a night anywhere on the 
great Taieri swamp, as it was termed in those days. There was a totara- 
bark house in the bush at the Taieri village, known as Milne's accom- 
modation-house, that was noted far and wide for mosquitos; and amidst 
the wondrous tales of adventure and discomfort which every traveller in 
those days had to tell, the nocturnal sufferings endured, and the expedients 
tried, to escape from the mosquitos at Milne’s accommodation-house, always 
bore a prominent part. The Tokomairiro Plain, on the other hand, was 
never considered bad for mosquitos, though up near the bush there were 
always plenty of them. The Molyneux Island, on the other hand, was 
notoriously bad; but it must be borne in mind that in those days this 
Ultima Thule of the Otago block was classic ground for all the wild tales 
of hair-breadth escapes, privations, and adventures that could possibly 
fall to the lot of a New Zealand colonist. But you must not suppose 
that I wish you to think the tales about mosquitos were ‘mythical. i 
will come to actual facts within my own experience and observation. In 
the years 1856-8, before the country was settled, I was engaged as a 
government officer surveying the Waihopai, New River, and Mataura 
Plains trigonometrically, and of course lived entirely in tents. The 
mosquitos were, I can assure you, anything but myths, especially on 
the New River. On retiring to our tents in the evening, we tried to 
get rid of them by burning green branches, cow-dung, or anything that 
would make a dense smoke to drive them out, and then quickly and 
carefully closing up the curtain of the tent endeavoured to pop off to sleep 
before they made good their entrance again. But, alas! we soon found 
that the chances of success were small indeed, for those that had fallen 
stupefied to the ground with the smoke soon revived, and the first noise of 
the singing of their wings was the signal for the breaking out of an infernal 
chorus from all those that had been secreted about the blankets and fern 
forming our beds, who all sallied forth with bloodthirsty energy to revenge 
the retreat of their fellows upon the now prostrate and passive foe. Then, 
if “ tired nature's sweet restorer” had not already “ paid his ready visit," 
good-bye to “ balmy sleep." So intolerable and incessant was the nuisance 
that at last I hit upon a plan which completely baffled them, and I could 
go to sleep with myriads buzzing round me and awake in the morning 
unharmed. For the benefit of all travellers, I must tell you what it was. 
In the first place I wrapped myself round in an opossum rug with the 
skinny side out. This they could not penetrate through, for it is a fact 
that they will penetrate through ordinary blankets. For the protection of | 
my head and face, which, of course, had to be outside the rug, and were the 
