ATTRACTION TO SOUNDS 117 
surface of the screen. All the pins were connected together electrically, the 
whole forming one electrode of the secondary coil of induction coil, while the 
wire screen formed the other electrode. An alternating current of high potential 
was then passed and when the note was sounded the insects precipitated them- 
selves against the screen and were immediately electrocuted. Mr. Weaver, un- 
fortunately, does not state whether males only were captured in this way.” 
Nuttall and Shipley point out that Grassi (1900) states that persons are more 
liable to be bitten by Anopheles when engaged in conversation than when silent, 
and that Joly (1901) in Madagascar observed that mosquitoes were decidedly 
affected by music and that if he played a stringed instrument the mosquitoes 
began to fly about in the room and flew in from the outside, gathering about the 
player in great numbers. They also state that Ross has been informed by Mr. 
Brennen, of Jamaica, that he has seen mosquitoes there “ respond to such sounds 
as a continuous whoop or hum,” stating further, “I have tried the experience 
lately, and find swarms gather round my head when I make a continuous whoop.” 
A very interesting instance of the attraction of mosquitoes to sounds of certain 
pitch, as related in a letter to the London Times of October 29, 1901, by Sir 
Hiram 8. Maxim, is published by Nuttall and Shipley: 
“In 1878 I made and erected an apparatus for lighting the grounds of the 
Grand Union Hotel at Saratoga Springs, New York, by electricity. The lamps 
employed were rather large and each was provided with its own dynamo machine. 
One of the lamps worked something like a telephone and gave a note the pitch 
of which corresponded exactly with the strips on the commutator passing under 
the brushes of the dynamo machine. Some of the other lamps would occasionally 
give off a musical note, but only for a few minutes at a time. With this one, 
however, the note was practically constant, and no adjustment of the carbons 
had the least effect upon it. One evening whilst examining this lamp I found 
that everything in the immediate vicinity was covered with small insects. They 
did not appear to be attempting to get into the globe, but rather into the box that 
was giving off the musical note. Upon a close examination of these insects I 
found that they were all the same kind—viz., mosquitoes, and, what is more, all 
male mosquitoes. Although there were certainly 200 times as many female mos- 
quitoes on the grounds as males, I was unable to find a single female mosquito 
that was attracted in the least by the sound. When the lamps were started in 
the beginning of the evening every male mosquito would at once turn in the 
direction of the lamp, and as it were face the music, and then fly off in the 
direction from which the sound proceeded. It then occurred to me that the two 
little feathers on the head of the male mosquito acted as ears, that they vibrated 
in unison with the music of the lamp, and as the pitch of the note was almost 
identical with the buzzing of the female mosquito the male took the music to be 
the buzzing of the female. I am neither a naturalist nor an entomologist, still 
I was much interested in this peculiar and interesting phenomenon. I wrote 
down a full account of it at the time and sent it to a scientific paper, but it ap- 
peared to be too stupid to find a place in that particular publication. However, 
it now appears that others have stumbled across the same thing. A very interest- 
ing experiment may be easily made in the following manner :—Obtaining a 
tuning-fork which gives a musical note as much like the hum of the female mos- 
quito as possible. If you strike this fork within 20 ft. of a male mosquito he 
will at once turn about, face the music, and erect the two little feathers on his 
head, something after the manner of a cockatoo.” 
