MOSQUITOES 149 



back ; then the perfect insect steps out, rests a moment 

 to dry its wings, and sails away into the air. 



It is very doubtful if the male Anopheles, which can 

 easily be distinguished from the female by its bushy 

 feathered tentacles, quite visible to the naked eye, ever 

 sucks blood. The habit in the female is possibly 

 prompted by a desire to obtain material for the 

 growth of the ova. Out of the numerous genus Culex 

 only four species are known in which the male bites ; 

 and it is probable that malaria is always conveyed 

 from man to man by the activity of the female. It 

 is difficult to say how long mosquitoes live in the 

 imago state — certainly, if fed, for many weeks. The 

 earlier collectors, not knowing how to feed them, used 

 to cork them up in glass tubes, and then, noticing in a 

 day or two that the poor insect had died, retired to 

 their studies and wrote moral essays on the brevity of 

 life, or learned treatises on the duration of life in rela- 

 tion to the methods of ovipositing. Now we feed the 

 imagos — as a rule, on bananas — and they live well in 

 confinement. The fertilized female survives the winter, 

 hibernating in some dusky corner, and it is probable 

 that some of the eggs also carry the species over the 

 cold months from autumn to the following spring. 



It should, perhaps, be mentioned that the infected 

 mosquito does not transmit the parasites to its off- 

 spring. This was an important point to ascertain, 

 because it is known that the tick which causes Texas 

 fever does transmit its parasite to the young ticks, 

 and they in turn communicate the disease to the oxen. 

 A somewhat similar case of the transference from 

 parent to offspring of an organism causing disease 

 is that of the Pebrine, caused by a parasite which 

 attacks silkworms, and which is conveyed by the in- 

 fected ova from one generation to another. 



The above short resume of the life-history and 

 habits of Anopheles has been given as a prelude to the 



