These insects were decidedly troublesome and we had to keep constant watch of ourselves to prevent serious trouble with them. There is an especially large mosquito which not only stings fearfully but deposits larvae beneath the skin. It is almost impossible to notice this at the time but it soon becomes a live worm in there, and then a great sore breaks out, caused by the bug so that he can crawl out and grow into a mosquito and sting someone else, and start another bug, and so on.
Worse than this were the “nail beetles.” These chaps bore beneath the finger nails and toe nails. They do this boring so cleverly that frequently one does not feel it at all. They, too, deposit larvae, and the result is extremely dangerous as great sores come up beneath the nails and one is likely to lose not only the nail, but the finger or toe from blood poisoning, if even worse effects from the poisoning do not set in.
We used a ten per cent solution of carbolic acid as a preventive. Constant watchfulness was the price of freedom from becoming nesting places for ’skeeters and bugs.
If we had food in kettles we had to set the legs in cups of oil to keep out the bugs.
Not far from where our mine is located is the property of the late Major John Purroy Mitchel, former mayor of New York City and later an aviator, who was killed while in training at a Southern aviation field. He knew this country well and had had many adventures down through here where he had considerable success in mining diamonds.
CHAPTER XXI
THE FIRST DIAMOND!
OF course, once landed at the site of our diamond mine, we had to have a comfortable, permanent home. A “logie” it is called here, doubtless a corruption of the Italian “loggia” which has as its equivalent in English the word “lodge.” Strictly speaking, a logie is a building that is partly open at the sides and consists of more veranda than closed in room. Ours we had built so that it could be closed in, but except in driving rains the sides were always open. We could screen them to keep out mosquitoes and keep quite comfortable.