Chap. XII.] 
MOSQUITOES. 
435 
Even in the midst of endurance from their onslaughts 
one cannot but be amused by the ingenuity of their 
movements ; as if aware of the risk incident to an open 
assault, a favourite mode of attack is, when concealed 
by a table, to assail the ankles through the meshes of 
the stocking, or the knees which are ineffectually pro- 
tected by a fold of Eussian duck. When you are 
reading, a mosquito will rarely settle on that portion of 
your hand which is within range of your eyes, but 
cunningly stealing by the underside of the book fastens 
on the wrist or little ringer, and noiselessly inserts his 
proboscis there. I have tested the classical expedient 
recorded by Herodotus, who states that the fishermen 
inhabiting the fens of Egypt, cover their beds with their 
nets, knowing that the mosquitoes, although they bite 
through linen robes, will nob venture through a net. 1 
But, notwithstanding the opinion of Spence 2 , that nets 
with meshes an inch square will effectually exclude 
them, I have been satisfied by painful experience that 
(if the theory be not altogether fallacious) at least the 
modern mosquitoes of Ceylon are uninfluenced by the 
instance in which mention is made mals, the fly and the dog, exhi- 
of the miracle of Moses, the Sep- biting the courage and the cunning 
tuagint says that the fly produced of both, and fastening on its victim 
was the icvvo^via, the " dog-fly." with the noise and rapidity of 
What insect was meant by this an arrow" — ■ fj.eTa po7£bu Kaddnep 
name it is not now easy to determine, peXos. This seems to identify the 
but iELiAN intimates that the dog- dog-fly of the Septuagint with the 
fly both inflicts a wound and emits description of the Psalmist, Ps. 
a booming sc and, in both of which Ixxviii. 45, and to vindicate the 
particulars it accords with the conjecture that the tormenting 
mosquito (lib. iv. 51) ; and Philo- mosquito, and not the house-fly, 
JuDiEUS, in his Vita Mosis, lib. i. was commissioned by the Lord to 
ch. xxiii., descanting on the plague humble the obstinacy of the 
of flies, and using the term of the Egyptian tyrant. 
Septuagint, Kuuo/j.v?a, describes it 1 Herodotus, Euterpe, xcv. 
as combining the characteristic of 2 Kjkby and Skence's Ento- 
" the most impudent of all ani- mology, letter iv. 
F F 2 
