"DEAR SIR: Attached please find clipping from the Washington Post of June 20, 1899, being the first story that ever appeared in print, so far as I can learn, of the depredations of the _Melanotestis picipes_, better known now as the kissing bug. In my rounds as police reporter of the Post, I noticed, for two or three days before writing this story, that the register of the Emergency Hospital of this city contained unusually frequent notes of 'bug-bite' cases. Investigating, on the evening of June 19th I learned from the hospital physicians that a noticeable number of patients were applying daily for treatment for very red and extensive swellings, usually on the lips, and apparently the result of an insect bite. This led to the writing of the story attached. "Very truly yours, "James F. McElhone." [Illustration: The Washington Post. TUESDAY, JUNE 20, 1899. BITE OF A STRANGE BUG. Several Patients Have Appeared at the Hospitals Very Badly Poisoned. Lookout for the new bug. It is an insidious insect that bites without causing pain and escapes unnoticed. But afterward the place where it has bitten swells to ten times its normal size. The Emergency Hospital has had several victims of this insect as patients lately and the number is increasing. Application for treatment by other victims are being made at other hospitals, and the matter threatens to become something like a plague. None of those who have been bitten saw the insect whose sting proves so disastrous. One old negro went to sleep and woke up to find both his eyes nearly closed by the swelling from his nose and cheeks, where the insect had alighted. The lips seems to be the favorite point of attack. William Smith, a newspaper agent, of 327 Trumbull street, went to the Emergency last night with his upper lip swollen to many times its natural size. The symptoms are in every case the same, and there is indication of poisoning from an insect's bite. The matter is beginning to interest the physicians, and every patient who comes in with the now well-known marks is closely questioned as to the description of the insect. No one has yet been found who has seen it. ]