DISAGREEABLE RENCONTRE. 443 



that, to commence with the first letter, the inscrip- 

 tion must be read from the right side, and in this 

 manner, or some analogous one, making use of, 

 for example, a long narrow leaf, I endeavour to 

 account for the different directions of writing, 

 either from the right hand to the left, or vice versa, 

 which is customary among various nations. 



Whilst sitting under a tree to-day, a caterpillar 

 fell upon my bare neck, and feeling a disagreeable 

 kind of tickling, I put my hand upon it and threw 

 it away. It was a common enough looking butterfly 

 caterpillar, but it had most annoyingly disagreeable 

 effects, which lasted for an hour afterwards, being 

 exactly like the irritation that would be produced 

 by a little of the fine hair of the pods of the Doli- 

 chos priiriens being rubbed over the part. I could 

 not conceive it possible to be the result of an insect 

 simply crawling upon my neck, so I looked about to 

 see if there were not some vegetable production in 

 my neighbourhood that would account for it. Seeing 

 my attentive examination of the spot, and sus- 

 pecting the object of my search, by the restless 

 movements of my neck in the loose collar of my 

 frock, Ohmed Medina, laughing, pointed out to 

 me several other little animals suspended at the 

 extremities of long silken filaments from the 

 extreme branches over my bead, and I then recol- 

 lected the circumstance of having previously 

 removed one of these caterpillars from my neck. 



We were not troubled much by visits from the 



