156 CAMPS IN THE CARIBBEES. 
it back with a tremor of horror. It had come in contact 
with the diggest bug in the world. Its back seemed 
hard as iron, and its mandibles were as long as my 
fingers. I had always boasted my immunity from bed- 
bugs, and that the greatest army of them could not 
make me afraid. But now they were coming to con- 
vince me of my mistake. I could hear them burrowing 
through the leaves, could feel them crawling over me, 
and, unable to endure it longer, sprang up with a cry 
and rushed out into the open air. The perspiration 
rolled off me, and my hands twitched nervously, for I 
was pretty thoroughly frightened. At my command, 
my boys lighted a torch and examined the leaves ; and 
when they drew out three huge beetles almost as large 
as my hand, and I stood regarding them with horror, 
they burst into fits of laughter. 
“Ah! Monsieur very fear, he ’fraid jumbie, he 
*fraid razor-grinder.” 
“What do you call them?” 
“ Person say he ‘razor-grinder.’” 
“Does he grind razors?” 
“Oh, no! mazs he make noise like he make to grind.” 
“Hark zat noise!” said Meyong, raising his hand to 
command silence. Through the forest came a sharp, 
whizzing sound, like that produced by the wheel of 
the perambulating razor and knife grinder. 
“Zat make by heself.” 
“ How does he make it?” 
His answer was to this effect: The beetle is pro- 
vided with two long mandibles, articulating like the 
thumb and forefinger, placed ‘immediately above the 
mouth. They are smooth and hard, and furnished 
with protuberances, or notched, while the upper man- 
