SO DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



in the house of the illustrious Swede, was attacked by the 

 disease in question, which quickly gave way to the usual 

 remedies. Eight days after, it returned again, and was 

 as before soon removed. A third time, at the end of the 

 same period, he was seized with it. All the while he had 

 been living like the rest of the family, who had neverthe- 

 less escaped. This, of course, occasioned no little inquiry 

 into the cause of what had happened. Linne, aware that 

 Bartholinus had attributed the dysentery to trisects, which 

 he professed to have seen, recommended it to his pupil 

 to examine his feces. Rolander, following this advice, 

 discovered in them innumerable animalcules, which upon 

 a close examination proved to be Acari. It was next a 

 question how he alone came to be singled out by them ; 

 and thus he accounts for it. It was his habit not to drink 

 at his meals ; but in the night, growing thirsty, he often 

 sipped some liquid out of a vessel made of juniper wood. 

 Inspecting this very narrowly, he observed, in the chinks 

 between the ribs, a white line, which, when viewed under 

 a lens, he found to consist of innumerable Acari, pre- 

 cisely the same with those that he had voided. Various 

 experiments were tried with them, and a preparation of 

 rhubarb was found to destroy them most effectually. He 

 afterwards discovered them in vessels containing acids, 

 -and often under the bung of casks 3 . In the instance 

 here recorded, the dysentery, or diarrhoea, was evidently 

 produced by these Acari ; but it would be going too far, 

 I apprehend, to assert that they are invariably the cause 

 of that disease. 



That Scabies, or the itch, is occasioned by an Acarus 



a Amccn. Ac. v. 04-98-. 



