to the _vinchuca_, and I greatly doubt whether any other blood-sucking
parasite has been equally favoured by nature in this respect.

Imagine then my sensations when I heard the sound of not one, but two
or three pairs of wings! I tried to forget the sound and go to sleep.
I tried to forget about those rough old walls full of interstices--a
hundred years old they were, my host had informed me. Most interesting
old house, thought I; and then very suddenly a fiery itching took
possession of my great toe. There it is! said I; heated blood, late
supper, dancing, and all that. I can almost imagine that something has
actually bitten me, when of course nothing of that kind has happened.
Then, while I was furiously rubbing and scratching it, feeling a
badger-like disposition to gnaw it off, my left arm was pierced with
red-hot needles. My attentions were quickly transferred to that part;
but soon my busy hands were called elsewhere, like a couple of
hard-worked doctors in a town afflicted with an epidemic; and so all
night long, with only occasional snatches of miserable sleep, the
contest went on.

I rose early, and, going to a wide stream, a quarter of a mile from
the house, took a plunge which greatly refreshed me and gave me strength
to go in quest of my horse. Poor brute! I had intended giving him a
day's rest, so pleasant and hospitable had the people shown themselves;
but now I shuddered at the thought of spending another night in such
a purgatory. I found him so lame that he could scarcely walk, and so
returned to the house on foot and very much cast down. My host consoled
me by assuring me that I would sleep the siesta all the better for
having been molested by those "little things that go about," for in
this very mild language he described the affliction. After breakfast,
at noon, acting on his hint, I took a rug to the shade of a tree and,