which it is enabled to lay hold of the hairs, on which it climbs. There
is scarcely any animal known to multiply so fast as this unwelcome
intruder: from an experiment of Lieuenhoek, a louse in eight weeks, may
see five thousand of its descendants.

Among the ancients, what is called the lousy disease was not uncommon:
Antiochus, Herod, and others are said to have died of this disorder.




ITCH ... MITE.

[Illustration]

CHEGO ... DEATHWATCH.


There are many species of mites, beside the itch animal and mite above:
to the naked eye, they appear like moving particles of dust: but the
microscope discovers them to be perfect animals, having as regular a
figure, and performing all the functions of life as perfectly as
creatures that exceed them many times in bulk: their eggs are so small
that a regular computation shews that 90 millions of them are not so
large as a common Pigeon's egg.

The Chego is a very small animal, about one fourth the size of a common
flea: it is very troublesome, in warm climates, to the poor blacks, such
as go barefoot, and the slovenly: it penetrates the skin, under which it
lays a bunch of eggs, which swell to the bigness of a small pea.