POO hi  MOSOUINOES OF THE UNITED: 
STATES. 
ON MOSQUITOES IN GENERAL. 
Abundance of mosquitoes.—The literature of popular entomology is 
full of instances of the enormous numbers in which mosquitoes occa- 
sionally occur. Persons interested in this line of curious reading 
should consult Kirby and Spence’s An Introduction to Entomology, 
Volume I, pages 112-120, and Frank Cowan’s Curious Facts in the 
History of Insects, pages 278-286. Referring to their occurrence in 
the far northern regions, Kirby and Spence, for example, say: ‘‘ In Lap- 
land their numbers are so prodigious as to be compared to a flight of 
snow when the flakes fall thickest or to the dust of the earth. The 
natives can not take a mouthful of food or lie down to sleep in their 
cabins unless they be fumigated almost to suffocation. In the air you 
can not draw your breath without having your mouth and nostrils 
filled with them, and unguents of tar, fish grease, or cream, or nets 
steeped in fetid birch oil are scarcely sufficient to protect even the case- 
hardened cuticle of the Laplander from their bite.” Elsewhere the 
same authorities say: ‘‘In the neighborhood of the Crimea the Russian 
soldiers are obliged to sleep in sacks to defend themselves from the 
mosquitoes, and even this is not a sufficient security, for several of 
them die in consequence of mortification produced by the bites of these 
furious bloodsuckers.” Elsewhere: ‘*And Captain Stedman, in Amer- 
ica, as a proof of the dreadful state to which he and his soldiers were 
reduced by them, mentions that they were forced to sleep with their 
heads thrust into holes made in the earth with their bayonets and 
their necks wrapped round with their hammocks.” Humboldt says: 
‘*Between the little harbor of Higuerote and the mouth of the Rio 
Unare the wretched inhabitants are accustomed to stretch themselves 
on the ground and pass the nights buried in the sand 3 or 4 inches 
deep, leaving out the head only, which they cover with a handker- 
chief.” Theodoretus says that Sapor, King of Persia, was compelled 
to raise the siege of Nisibis by a plague of gnats, which attacked his 
elephants and beasts of burden and so caused the rout of his army. 
In modern times nearly every hunter and fisherman in this country 
has had experience with mosquitoes which renders easy of belief all 
of the old-time stories. The instance mentioned in Bulletin No. 4, of 
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