semi-barbarous South American _estancias_! I swear I will turn poet
myself, and go back some day to astonish old _blase_ Europe with
something so--so--What the deuce was that? My sleepy soliloquy was
suddenly brought to a most lame and impotent conclusion, for I had
heard a sound of terror--the unmistakable _zz-zzing_ of an insect's
wings. It was the hateful _vinchuca_. Here was an enemy against
which British pluck and six-shooters are of no avail, and in whose
presence one begins to experience sensations which are not usually
supposed to enter into the brave man's breast. Naturalists tell us
that it is the _Connorhinus infectans_, but, as that information
leaves something to be desired, I will proceed in a few words to
describe the beast. It inhabits the entire Chilian, Argentine, and
Oriental countries, and to all the dwellers in this vast territory it
is known as the _vinchuca_; for, like a few volcanoes, deadly
vipers, cataracts, and other sublime natural objects, it has been
permitted to keep the ancient name bestowed on it by the aborigines.
It is all over of a blackish-brown colour, as broad as a man's
thumb-nail, and flat as the blade of a table-knife--when fasting. By
day it hides, bug-like, in holes and chinks, but no sooner are the
candles put out, than forth it comes to seek whom it may devour; for,
like the pestilence, it walks in darkness. It can fly, and in a dark
room knows where you are and can find you. Having selected a nice
tender part, it pierces the skin with its proboscis or rostrum, and
sucks vigorously for two or three minutes, and, strange to say, you
do not feel the operation, even when lying wide awake. By that time
the creature, so attenuated before, has assumed the figure, size, and
general appearance of a ripe gooseberry, so much blood has it drawn
from your veins. Immediately after it has left you the part begins to
swell up and burn as if stung by nettles. That the pain should come
after and not during the operation is an arrangement very advantageous