562 Sleeping Sickness 



The L. megistis "is almost entirely a domestic insect." "The adults enter 

 inhabited houses but never those that have been abandoned. In houses which are 

 old or badly kept they are to be found in cracks and holes in the walls, where 

 they lay their eggs; the early stages, which are wingless, crawl out of their resting 

 places in the walls so soon as the lights are put out and make their way to the beds 

 of the occupants of the house. The adults behave in the same manner, but as 

 they are powerful fliers, they can reach the people . who sleep in hammocks. 

 The bite is said to be painless and to leave no mark." 



"The eggs of L. megistis are of a creamy white color and are laid in batches of 

 from eight to twelve, and as many as forty-five such batches may be laid. Ac- 

 cording to Neiva they hatch in twenty-five to forty days. The larva is of a uni- 

 form light color when it emerges, becoming darker later; it takes its first feed 

 from five to eight days after emerging from the egg, and the second from the 

 fifteenth to the twentieth day; it changes its skin (first nymphal stage) after 

 about forty-five days. The second molt takes place during the second or third 

 month, and the third during the fourth or sixth month. The fourth molt occurs 

 about' the igoth day after the larva has hatched out from the egg; this stage lasts 

 at least forty-two days. Neiva states that this time is the most critical period in 

 its life, and that large numbers of them die. After the next molt the adult stage 

 is reached, and eight days later they are ready to suck blood; egg-laying com- 

 mences about the fifty-fifth day after the first feed. One female kept under 

 observation by Neiva for about three and a half months laid 218 eggs in thirty- 

 eight batches. Under favorable conditions of food supply the cycle from egg to 

 egg is completed in about 324 days." 



This bug, when experimentally infected with Schizotrypanum cruzi, trans- 

 mitted the infection to monkeys, guinea-pigs, rabbits and dogs. Both males and 

 females bite and may transmit the parasites. 



