104 DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



employed in the harvest, in the flesh of which it buries 

 itself at the root of the hairs, producing intolerable itch- 

 ino\ attended by inflammation and considerable tumours, 

 and sometimes even occasioning fevers a . — A similar in- 

 sect is found in Brazil, abounding in the rainy season, 

 particularly during the gleams of sunshine, or fine days 

 that intervene ; as small as a point, and moving very 

 fast. These animals get upon the linen and cover it in 

 a moment ; afterwards they insinuate themselves into the 

 skin and occasion a most intolerable itching. They are 

 with difficulty extracted, and leave behind them large 

 livid tumours, which subside in a day or two. An in- 

 sect very tormenting to the wood-cutters and the settlers 

 on the Mosquito shore and the bay of Honduras, and 

 called by them the doctor, is thought to be synonymous 

 with this b . — More serious consequences have been known 

 to follow the bite of another Acarus i^elated to the above, 

 if not the same species, common in Martinique, and 

 called there the Bete rouge. When our soldiers in canro 

 were attacked by this animal, dangerous ulcers succeeded 

 the symptoms just mentioned, which, in several cases, 

 became so bad, that the limb affected was obliged to be 

 taken off c . 



I was once collecting insects in Norwood, near Lon- 

 don, when my hands were covered by a number of small 

 hungry ticks, which were so greedy after blood, that 

 they penetrated deep into my flesh, giving me no little 

 pain ; and it was not without difficulty that I extracted 



a Natural. Miscell., ii. t. 4r2. 



h Lindleyin the Royal Military Chronicle for March 1815, p. 4.59. 

 c 1 o>ve this information to Robinson Kittoe, Esq. formerly Clerk 

 of the Cheque in the King's Yard, Woolwich, 



