Live Stock. 



364 



[October, 1908. 



saw him with the corpse of the mosquito 

 in his jaws. After that I used almost 

 daily to put into his box some small in- 

 sect which I had previously killed. 

 On the twentieth day he was as lively, 

 as hale and hear ty, as when he was 

 first captured, and as I have said before, 

 the piece of paper was not touched. 

 After I had had him for about ten 

 days I placed in his box a piece of the 

 paper which makes the foundation of 

 the back of a book, but the fish-insect 

 did not take the least notice of it. 

 When it ran over it, it did not stop 

 to investigate. 



On the twentieth day I caught a 

 second fish-insect, a smaller one than 

 my first capture, and introduced it 

 into the box. The two creatnres ignored 

 one another so long as I observed 

 them. A fish-insect abhors the light ; 

 it is therefore difficult to observe his 

 habits. Although these insects took no 

 notice of one another while I was 

 watching them, they must have played 

 high jinks after my back was turned. 

 It happened that I did not close the 

 box tightly, the consequence was that 

 my fish-insects had disappeared by the 

 next morning. There had probably 

 been an elopement during the night ; 

 I went to England on leave short!} 

 after that. On returning to India I 

 was posted to Lahore where fish-insects 

 seem to be unusually scarce. Hence 

 my researches were at a standstill for 

 a long time, during which I held a 

 good opinion of the fish-insect, going 

 so far as to make the following public 

 declaration : "I believe that the fish- 

 insect does prey upon the insects which 

 attack books, also upon any soft-bodied 

 creatures he is able to catch. It is 

 possible that he does soil and stain 

 books when he is lying up in them 

 during the day. This I believe is the 

 worst that can be said against him." 

 But, alack, and alas ! I have since been 

 disillusioned. I am once again among the 

 company of the orthodox. It happened 



in this wise. Last July I went for ten 

 days to Mussoorie, where I was given a 

 dressing-room which contained anything 

 from twenty to a hundred fish-insects. I 

 had not been three days in the place, 

 before I noticed that the label on my 

 bottle of quinine tabloids was growing 

 beautifully less. Some tissue paper that 

 my wife had put on a shelf became liter- 

 ally riddled with holes in an incredible 

 short space of time. The same fate over- 

 took some muslin which had never been 

 used. The fish-insects also played havoc 

 with some new hats that had come out 

 from Home and were being stored up for 

 some great occasion. The tule in the 

 hats was the attraction ; it was this 

 that rapidly became riddled with holes ; 

 no other parts of the hats were touched. 



The Mussoorie fish-insects also did con- 

 siderable damage to tne covers of some 

 books which were bound in what 

 publishers describe as " linen." 



The glaze on these proved the attrac- 

 tion. In order to keep out the fish- 

 insects my wife placed quantities of 

 naphthaline and black pepper in her 

 boxes, but this seems to attract rather 

 than repel the hardy creatures ! The 

 above-enumerated articles alone were 

 touched. It is evident that whatever 

 the fish-insect may eat in the way of 

 insects, it is injurious to the covers of 

 books if these contain any kind of glaze. 

 It dots not do much damage to the 

 leaves of books, even when these are 

 glossy, because it cannot get at them. 

 Anything starchy appears to be parti- 

 cularly palatable to fish-insects. 



There are, of course, many species of 

 fish-insects, some of which are probably 

 purely insectivorous, and hence not to 

 be regarded as pests. But the common 

 fish. insect — the Lepisma domestica— of 

 India is assuredly not a creature to be 

 encouraged — (D. D. in the Indian Field.) 

 — Indian Forester, Vol. XXXIV., July, 

 1908. No. 7. 



