66 DIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 
from that of bees, wasps, and other Hymenoptera, being more analogous to 
the venomous tooth of serpents ; it wounds us with no barbed darts con- 
cealed in a sheath, but only with a simple incurved mucro terminating an 
ampullaceous joint. ‘Two orifices, or, according to some, three, are said 
to instil the poison, which, we are informed, is sometimes as white as milk, 
This venom in our European species is seldom attended, accept to minor 
animals, 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, numbness 
in various parts of the body, tumours in the tongue, and dimness of sight, 
which symptoms last from twenty-four to forty-eight hours. The only 
means of saving the lives of our soldiers who were stung by them in Egypt, 
was amputation. One species is said to occasion madness ; and the black 
scorpion, both of South American and Ceylon, frequently inflicts a mortal 
wound.2 No known animal is more cruel and ferocious in its manners ; 
they kill and devour their own young without pity as soon as they are 
born, and they are equally savage to their fellows when grown up. Terrible 
however and revolting as these creatures appear’, we are gravely told by 
Naudé, that there is a species of scorpion in Italy which is domesticated, 
and put between the sheets to cool the beds. during the heats of summer! !? 
I must next say something of insects that annoy us solely by their jaws. 
Of this description is Galeodes araneoides, which is related to ‘te scorpion, 
-although devoid of a sting. The bite of this animal, which is a native of 
the Cape of Good Hope and of Russia®, is represented to be often fatal 
both to man and beast. Another species of Galeodes is described by Pro- 
fessor Lichtenstein, which, from the trivial name that he has given it 
(fatalis), may be supposed to be as venomous as the former.* 
The bite of one of the centipedes (Scolopendra morsitans) —theunderjaws, 
or rather arms, of which are armed with a strong claw, furnished like the 
sting of the scorpion with an orifice, visible under a common lens, from which 
poison issues—is less tremendous than that of the animal last mentioned : 
but though not mortal, its wounds are more painful than those produced 
by the sting of the scorpion ; and as these animals creep everywhere, even 
into beds, they must be very annoying in warm climates where they abound. 
Dr. Martin Lister in his Travels, has given us a figure of an insect related 
to this genus, that he saw in Plumier’s collection, which appears to have 
been eighteen inches in length, and three quarters of an inch in width, 
having ninety-five legs on each side, the first eight of which are armed with 
double claws, and two inches of the tail being without legs. It may form 
a distinct genus, and is probably a native of South America: Yet even 
this monstrous insect is nothing to those at Carthagena, mentioned by 
Ulloa (if indeed we may credit his account, or if his translator has not mis- 
taken his meaning), which sometimes exceeded a yard in length and five 
inches in breadth! The bite of this gigantic serpent-like creature, he tells 
1 Ulloa’s Voy. i. 61, 62. Dr. Clarke's Travels, i. 486. Amoreux, 197. Mr. 
W.S. MacLeay relates to me that soon after his arrival at the Havana he was stung 
by an immense scorpion, but was agreeably surprised to find the pain considerably 
less than the sting of a wasp, and of incomparably shorter duration. 
WA Th ae Anecdotes, 427. See on the subject of Scorpions, Amoreux, 41—b4, 
8 Fab, Suppl. 294. 2. 4 Catal, Ham, 1797, 151—195. 
