Show SOME POISONOUS BEDFELLOWS The Truth About Scorpions Tarantulas aud Centipedes By Dr Eugene Murray Aaron During my life in tropical countries I found that there were three sorts of occasions oc-casions edfellows that one could never be too careful to see were not between the sheets or otherwise hidden in bed or hammock before retiring These dangerous bedfellows were centipedes cen-tipedes scorpions and tarantulas or trapdoor trap-door spiders Of the three I alway had the greatestdread of the scorpions partly I perhaps on account of their greater bulK but more I think because of their vil lanous temper So jar as 1 have observed the tarantula will only visit a house or even a camp in search of flies and other food and he will usually quickly retreat if his way is clear So too the centipedes as a rule prefer to hide under washboards or in damp cellars And decaying crs only coming out after food such as roaches and croton burrs The scorpion however seems to hide deliberately where he is sure to be unwelcome un-welcome and just why have never been able to understand Why he should prey ferashoe to almost any other hiding place and always the shoe you are going to put on ia the morning cannot say but so it is And it is with a great sense of relief that the explorer returned from a long stay in the tropics realizes that he does not longer need to carefully empty his shoes each time he intends putting them on It is alwys the unexpected that is happening sure enough with scorpions scor-pions However carefully alert one maybe may-be they are sure to turn up at the most unlocked for lames to be found in a coattail pocket on the inside ofa horses collar just as it is about to be put on the unsuspecting beast or in the bath tub which only a few moments before was I carefully inspected looking over a pile of letters on my study in Jamaica one afternoon a pile which I had carefully sorted out just before I be-fore lunch J heard a scratching in one of the large envelopes and before had time f Q or vl to drop it I received a painful wound I from the fang of a large scorpion Another time desiring to take an afternoon after-noon siesta in my hammock I shock out the shawl spread over it and from the folds fell a good sized female scorpion Having respread my shawl 1 turned over the pillow to beat it up when from under it dropped twentyfour baby scorpions Theyoung scorpions usually travel from point to point on the mothers back but while she is foraging around for food they are generally to be found in hiding near by as was this little colony Over seventy youngones have been found with one female The poison from these creatures is applied ap-plied in three different ways though tho poison itself much the same and similar in action i The fang of the scorpion is at the very tip of its long flexible tail as the abdomen abdo-men appearsto be and with it the creature crea-ture can deal itself quite as deadly a blow as it can to any enemy This it will do just as described in one of Byrons poems if it be surrounded with a circle of fire and assured of ltd inability to escape This I have tested quite a score of times thus disproving claims of certain naturalists nat-uralists who probably never saw a live scorpion that Byron invented the story ta suit his ryhme The amount of poison in a scorpion will not in my opinion kill a healthy adult although it will cause an amount of pain for some hours that is most difficult diffi-cult to bear with fortitude as i can tes tify from personal experience But a large female scorpion certainly can cause death to a halfgrown child I I I or to a timid woman or a man whose blood is in a bad or impure condi tion Butfor that matter the bite of a mosquito is known to have been sufficiently ficiently poisonous to be the last straw to break the back of the camel of scrofulous blood I The tarantula carries its poison at the base of the most savage looking fangs hat hang down from the lower side oi its I head Owing to their position tile term I I bite may be more correctly applied to the tarantula than to either of the others it is nevertheless not a bite but a sudden downward stroke of the fangs into the object ob-ject attacked I do not think there is much difference in tho amount of poison given by a scorpion scor-pion and a tarantula but that of the latter acts much more quickly and for a less time and is much more violent in its effect while it lasts The muscular contractions tractions and spasms of pain that it causes give rise to those ungovernable quiverings of the whole body which are so wonderfully portrayed by the Spanish dance of the tarantula a dance never to be forgotten by one who has seen it executed by a professional The tarantula ta-rantula however will usually content itself with one blow escaping immediately immedi-ately as though aware that its life is in danger whereas tho scorpion will cling to its victim and strike perhaps a half dozen blows until its poison sack is quite empty I have never found anyone who knew of a case where a centipede wounded a man without first having been stepped on rolled on or in some like manner hurt I Its poison is a much more dilute fluid than that of the others and is exuded I from the hollow feet It does not as a IOTIO fitincr nnnptnrp the skin with these sharp pointed i horny feet but depends Ion I-on the stinging sensation produced by its noison to win it immunity from further attack A centipede that I rolled on with my naked back in my sleep on the little steamer that plies on the San Juan river in Nicaragua left a thick red ridge as wide as my thumb quite across my back but there were no holes in my skin that a friend with a pocket lens could dif cover 0 Its poison is much less serious in effect than that of the other not much worse han a row of hornet stings would be but although the least painful of these three sometime bedfellows it is quite bad enough |