The wretched mules and horses were driven wild, racing about like mad animals, dashing into the water and out again, in among the trees; but, go where they would, their persecutors stuck to them in swarms. The poor dogs sat and howled piteously, and, prompted by a wise instinct to avoid their enemies, dug deep holes in the earth; and backing in lay with their heads at the entrance, whining, snapping, and shaking their ears, to prevent the mosquitos from getting in at them. There was no help for it—our camp had to be abandoned; we were completely vanquished and driven away—the work of about a hundred men stopped by tiny flies. Our only chance of escape was to retire into the hills, and return to complete our work late in the autumn, when they disappear. Hard wind is the only thing that quells them; but it simply drives them into the grass, to return on its lulling, if possible, more savagely hungry. Quaint old Spenser knew this; he says, speaking of gnats:— No man nor beast may rest or take repast For their sharp sounds and noyous injuries, Till the fierce northern wind with blustering blast Doth blow them quite away, and in the ocean cast. My notebook, as I open it now, is a mausoleum of scores of my enemies; there they lay, dry and flat; round some of them a stain of blood tells how richly they merited their untimely end. One thing has always puzzled me in the history of these ravenous cannibals—what on earth can they get to feed on, when there are no men or animals? I brought home specimens, of course; and I am by no means sure I feel any great pleasure in finding my foe to be a new species, but it is, and named _Culex pinguis_, because it was fatter and rounder than any of its known brethren. The habits of this new mosquito are, in every detail, the same as all the known species. The female lays her eggs, which are long and oval in shape, in the water; then aided by her hind-legs, she twists about the eggs, and tightly glues them together, into a very beautiful little boat-shaped bundle, that floats and drifts about in the water. In sunny weather the eggs are speedily hatched, and the larvæ lead an aquatic life. They are very active, diving to the bottom with great rapidity, and as quickly ascending to the surface to breathe; the respiratory organs being situated near the tail, on the eighth segment of the abdomen, they hang, as it were, in the water, head downwards. After shifting the skin three or four times, they change into the pupa form, in which state they move about, even more actively than before, aided by the tail, and two organs like paddles, attached to it. In this stage of their existence they never feed (I only wish they would always remain in this harmless condition); and although they still suspend themselves in the water, the position is reversed, the breathing organs being now placed on the chest.