. Crusoe's Island; a bird-hunter's story . mitted a pale, greenish light,and by holding a bottle full near a printed page, Iwas enabled to read quite readily. They even servedto illuminate my hut, for I caught a great many,and putting them in white flasks, the mouths ofwhich were covered with muslin, I hung themaround the walls. I released them every morning,and at night imprisoned a fresh supply, feedingthem on sweets, of which they partook with evidentpleasure. These insects were really very serviceable ; butthere were others, some of which had made their ap-pearance in my hut, not so pleasa
. Crusoe's Island; a bird-hunter's story . mitted a pale, greenish light,and by holding a bottle full near a printed page, Iwas enabled to read quite readily. They even servedto illuminate my hut, for I caught a great many,and putting them in white flasks, the mouths ofwhich were covered with muslin, I hung themaround the walls. I released them every morning,and at night imprisoned a fresh supply, feedingthem on sweets, of which they partook with evidentpleasure. These insects were really very serviceable ; butthere were others, some of which had made their ap-pearance in my hut, not so pleasant to the worst pests of the tropics are the centi-pede, tarantula, and scorpion. All of them like tohide beneath the thatch of the hut, and all are hide-ous in appearance. The stings of all three are poi-sonous, sometimes fatally so, especially to young chil-dren. Of the three, the centipede, I think, is themost to be feared, as it moves almost with the rapid-ity of light, leaving behind it—if it traverses the limb. SOME QUEER AND TROUBLESOME NEIGHBORS. 51 or body of a human being—a venomous track, punc-tured in the skin. Its poisonous punctures are made by the front pairof feet, which are supplied with poisonous ducts orglands ; but its sting is even worse, and sufficient tocause fever in a grown person. The natives fear itfar more than they do the scorpion or the tarantula,and have a superstitious dread of it. With its flat,glistening body, its scores of legs twinkling, and itsrapid motions, it appears the very embodiment of evil—as it is. As to the tarantulas, I saw but few of them ; butone leaped at my hand one morning, and came so nearseizing it with its horrible hairy legs that I was verymuch shocked. I killed it, and then instituted, a searchfor others of its kind, finding but one, its mate, whichI sent to join the first. A more insidious foe is the chigoe, or jigger, a spe-cies of flea, which burrows beneath the skin of onestoes, unless one i
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, bookidcrusoesi, booksubjectbirds
