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RESIDENCE AT TARAPOTO 71
was benumbed for a week afterwards. That was
at Guayaquil, where the scorpions are of different
species from those of the Amazon, and more virulent.
It is a common thing there for a person stung by
a scorpion to have the tongue paralysed for some
hours. This property suggests a new version of
The Taming of the Shrew, much to be commended
to Guayaquilian Petruchios.
The stinging properties of the large hairy tropical
caterpillars are well known. The venom resides in
the long fascicled hairs, and the pain of the sting
is so like that of a nettle although often far more
acute, and extending far beyond the surface stung
-that it is presumable the hairs are hollow, with
a poison-bag at the base, like the stinging hairs of
nettles. But an hour's careful examination of the
hairs in the live animal would settle this question,
so that it is useless to theorise about it. I have had
rather too much experience of mere mechanical
stinging by vegetable hairs, which are usually
minute or scabrous bristles, closely set on the
leaves, pods, or other parts of a plant, and
deciduous that a touch brings them off. The pocli
of Mucunas (i.e. Co witches), the spathes of some
palms, the spathe-like
bracts and stipules
Cecropias and some other Artocarps
with this sort of pubescence, and I hav
considerably punished in collecting and preparing
the specimens. In all these the bristle:-
least their points, remain sticking
it is this that causes the. irritation ; but
is visible
sting of a caterpillar nothing
beyond the inllained surface.
Leguminous trees are peculiarly
in the
alt