124 DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



scorpion. And though I shall not, with Aristotle, tell 

 you of Persian kings employing armies for several clays 

 in destroying them ; or, with Pliny, of countries that 

 they have depopulated ; yet my account will not be de- 

 void of that species of interest which the dread of its 

 power to do us injury imparts to any object. Could you 

 see one of these ferocious animals, perhaps a foot in 

 length, a size to which they sometimes attain, advancing 

 towards you in their usual menacing attitude, with its 

 claws expanded, and its many-jointed tail turned over its 

 head ; were your heart ever so stout, I think you would 

 start back and feel a horror come across you ; and, 

 though you knew not the animal, you would conclude 

 that such an aspect of malignity must be the precur- 

 sor of malignant effects. Nor would you be mistaken, as 

 you will presently see. This alarming animal, though 

 like hymenopterous insects it is armed with a sting, is in 

 no respect related to that order, and forms the only ge- 

 nus, at present known, of the others that is so armed. 

 Even its sting is totally different from that of bees, wasps, 

 and other Hymenoptera, being more analogous to the 

 venomous tooth of serpents ; it wounds us with no 

 barbed darts concealed in a sheath, but only with a 

 simple incurved mucro terminating an ampullaceous 

 joint. . Two orifices, or according to some three, are 

 said to instill the poison, which, we are informed, is 

 sometimes as white as milk. This venom in our Euro- 

 pean species is seldom attended, except to minor ani- 

 mals, by any very serious consequences ; yet when it is 

 communicated by the scorpion of warmer climates it 

 produces more baneful effects. The sting of certain 

 kinds common in South America causes fevers, numb- 

 ness in various parts of the body, tumours in the tongue. 



