w they grow, how they do not grow (after assuming the
winged state), and how they bite; for who has not endured the smart and
sting of these dipterous Shylocks, that almost torment us out of our
existence while taking their drop of our heart's blood--may be welcome to
our readers.

[Illustration: 61. Head of the Mosquito.]

The Mosquito will be our first choice. As she leaps off from her light
bark, the cast chrysalis skin of her early life beneath the waters, and
sails away in the sunlight, her velvety wings fringed with silken hairs,
and her neatly bodiced trim figure (though her nose is rather salient,
considering that it is half as long as her entire body), present a
beauty and grace of form and movement quite unsurpassed by her dipterous
allies. She draws near and softly alights upon the hand of the charmed
beholder, subdues her trumpeting notes, folds her wings noiselessly upon
her back, daintily sets down one foot after the other, and with an
eagerness chastened by the most refined delicacy for the feelings of her
victim, and with the air of Velpeau redivivus, drives through crushed
and bleeding capillaries, shrinking nerves and injured tissues, a
many-bladed lancet of marvellous fineness, of wonderful complexity and
fitness. While engorging herself with our blood, we will examine under
the microscope the mosquito's mouth. The head (Fig. 61) is rounded, with
the two eyes occupying a large part of the surface, and nearly meeting
on the top of the head. Out of the forehead, so to speak, grow the long,
delicate, hairy antennm (_a_), and just below arises the long beak which
consists of the bristle-like maxillae (_mx_, with their palpi, _mp_) and
mandibles (_m_), and the single hair-like labrum, these five
bristle-like organs being laid in the hollowed labium (_l_). Thus massed
into a single awl-like beak, the mosquito, without any apparent effort,
thrusts them all except the labium into the flesh. Her hind body may be
seen tilling with the red blood, until it cries quits, and the insect
withdraws its sting and flies sluggishly away. In a moment the wounded
parts itch slightly, though a very robust person may not notice the
irritation, or a more delicate individual if asleep; though if weakened
by disease, or if stung in a highly vascular and sensitive part, such as
the eyelid, the bite becomes really a serious matter. Multiply the
mosquito a thousand fold, and one flees their attacks and avoids their
haunts as he w