London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 3

by Henry Mayhew

The winged insects of the order to which the bed-bug belongs often inflict very painful wounds, and it is even stated, upon good authority, that an insect of the order, commonly known in the West Indies by the name of the wheel-bug, can communicate an electric shock to the person whose flesh it touches. The late Major-General Davies, R.A. (well known as a most accurate observer of nature and an indefatigable collector of her treasures, as well as a most admirable painter of them), having taken up this animal and placed it upon his hand, assures us that it gave him, with its legs, a considerable shock, as if from an electric jar, which he felt as high as his shoulders; and then dropping the creature, he observed six marks upon his hand where the six feet had stood.

Bugs are very voracious, and seem to bite most furiously in the autumn, as if determined to feast themselves before they retire to their winter quarters.

There is another pernicious bed insect—the flea (Pulex irritans, Linn.), which, being without wings, some of our readers may suppose to be nearly allied to the bed-bug, though it does not belong even to the same order, but to a new one (Aphaniptera, Kirby), established on the principle that the wings are obsolescent or inconspicuous.

Fleas, it may be worth remarking, are not all of one species; those which infest animals and birds differing in many particulars from the common bed-flea (Pulex irritans). As many as twelve distinct sorts of fleas have been found in Britain alone.[16] The most annoying species, however, is, fortunately, not indigenous, being a native of the tropical latitudes, and variously named in the West Indies, chigoe, jigger, nigua, tungua, and pique (Pulex penetrans, Linn.). According to Stedman, “this is a kind of small sand-flea, which gets in between the skin and the flesh without being felt, and generally under the nails of the toes, where, while it feeds, it keeps growing till it becomes of the size of a pea, causing no further pain than a disagreeable itching. In process of time its operation appears in the form of a small bladder, in which are deposited thousands of eggs, or nits, and which, if it breaks, produce so many young chigoes, which in course of time create running ulcers, often of very dangerous consequence to the patient. So much so, indeed, that I knew a soldier, the soles of whose feet were obliged to be cut away before he could recover; and some men have lost their limbs by amputation, nay, even their lives, by having neglected, in time, to root out these abominable vermin.” Walton mentions that a Capuchin friar, in order to study the history of the chigoe, permitted a colony of them to establish themselves in his feet: but before he could accomplish his object his feet mortified and had to be amputated.[17] No wonder that Cardan calls the insect “a very shrewd plague.”[18]

Several extraordinary feats of strength have been recorded of fleas by various authors,[19] and we shall here give our own testimony to a similar fact. At the fair of Charlton, in Kent, 1830, we saw a man exhibit three fleas harnessed to a carriage in the form of an omnibus, at least fifty times their own bulk, which they pulled along with great ease; another pair drew a chariot. The exhibitor showed the whole first through a magnifying glass, and then to the naked eye, so that we were satisfied there was no deception. From the fleas being of large size they were evidently all females.[20]

It is rarely, however, that we meet with fleas in the way of amusement, unless we are of the singular humour of the old lady mentioned by Kirby and Spence, who had a liking to them; “because,” said she, “I think they are the prettiest little merry things in the world; I never saw a dull flea in all my life.”

When Ray and Willoughby were travelling, they found “at Venice and Augsburg fleas for sale, and at a small price too, decorated with steel or silver collars round their necks. When fleas are kept in a box amongst wool or cloth, in a warm place, and fed once a-day, they will live a long time. When these insects begin to suck they erect themselves almost perpendicularly, thrusting their sucker, which originates in the middle of the forehead, into the skin. The itching is not felt immediately, but a little afterwards. As soon as they are full of blood, they begin to void a portion of it; and thus, if permitted, they will continue for many hours sucking and voiding. After the first itching no uneasiness is subsequently felt. Willoughby had a flea that lived for three months, sucking in this manner the blood of his hand; it was at length killed by the cold of winter.”[21]

According to Mouffet’s account of the sucker of the flea, “the point of his nib is somewhat hard, that he may make it enter the better; and it must necessarily be hollow, that he may suck out the blood and carry it in.”[22] Modern authors, particularly Straus and Kirby, show that Rösel was mistaken in supposing this sucker to consist of two pieces, as it is really made up of seven. First, there is a pair of triangular instruments, somewhat resembling the beak of a bird, inserted on each side of the mouth, under the parts which are generally regarded as the antennæ. Next, a pair of long sharp piercers (scalpella, Kirby), which emerge from the head below the preceding instruments; whilst a pair of feelers (palpi), consisting of four joints, is attached to these near their base. In fine, there is a long, slender tongue, like a bristle, in the middle of these several pieces.

Mouffet says, “the lesser, leaner, and younger the fleas are, the sharper they bite,—the fat ones being more inclined to tickle and play. They molest men that are sleeping,” he adds, “and trouble wounded and sick persons, from whom they escape by skipping; for as soon as they find they are arraigned to die, and feel the finger coming, on a sudden they are gone, and leap here and there, and so escape the danger; but so soon as day breaks they forsake the bed. They then creep into the rough blankets, or hide themselves in rushes and dust, lying in ambush for pigeons, hens, and other birds; also for men and dogs, moles and mice, and vex such as pass by. Our hunters report that foxes are full of them, and they tell a pretty story how they get quit of them. The fox, say they, gathers some handfuls of wool from thorns and briers, and wrapping it up, holds it fast in his mouth, then he goes by degrees into a cold river, and dips himself down by little and little; when he finds that all the fleas are crept so high as his head for fear of drowning, and ultimately for shelter crept into the wool, he barks and spits out the wool, full of fleas, and thus very froliquely being delivered from their molestations, he swims to land.”[23]

This is a little more doubtful even than the story told of Christina, queen of Sweden, who is reported to have fired at the fleas that troubled her with a piece of artillery, still exhibited in the Royal Arsenal at Stockholm.[24] Nor are fleas confined to the old continent, for Lewis and Clarke found them exceedingly harassing on the banks of the Missouri, where it is said the native Indians are sometimes compelled to shift their quarters, to escape their annoyance. They are not acquainted, it would therefore seem, with the device of the shepherds in Hungary, who grease their clothes with hog’s-lard to deter the fleas;[25] nor with the old English preventive: