The modus operandi of the mosquito was well described by the author of "The Anatomy of the Mouth Parts and Sucking Apparatus of Some Diptera." He said: "The withdrawal of blood is effected by means of a pumping apparatus at the base of the mouth parts.'

"

Professor Musk wanted to know which were the elective portions for the mosquito, and why some places were chosen rather than others. Dr. Krane replied that the nose, cheeks, forehead, and hands were generally chosen for operation, but it depended upon the person. In thin-skinned people it didn't make much difference where; it was easy to draw blood. Mosquitoes were guided in their selection of localities much as people are. If a soft spot behind the ear proved a better investment than a sun-burnt, hardened nose, the mosquito selected it. Her claims were all prior. No land act affected her. Indeed, she was a squatter.

Dr. Mickydoo asked whether mosquitoes were troubled with professional jealousies. He had known others that made it a business to draw blood, to quarrel over a victim. And he was curious to know if the culex ever proved ungrateful; whether one that was given a soft snap by a friend, and placed where he could draw the blood he was not able to find for himself, could be not only thankless but assuming. Dr. Krane replied that he did not know, but he felt sure that the inquirer's professional acumen would enable him to find out for himself.

Mr. McBryan said that he was interested in Dr. Krane's remarks, but he thought that while mosquitoes preferred the young to the old-and who didn't?-they rarely attacked peach-bloom cheeks, because arsenic interfered with their digestion. It didn't take much arsenic to disturb a mosquito.

Mr. Lydope said a few words. He was used to saying a few words. The missionaries had been blamed for bringing mosquitoes to Hawaii, but it was wrong. They had been charged with many sins, and this was not the least. The mosquito had never any respect for the Ten Commandments,

nor for religious things generally. Although it might like the blood of the average theologue, its life was too brief for any laborious work on theological subjects. He could justly blame the sailors for the mosquitoes.

Mr. N. Pelton had a plan to unfold. It was only one of some two hundred inventions he had not patented for want of means. All of his means went into the first patent. The idea was to inclose Kauai in a revolving wire net, resting on a central pivot placed on Waialeale. Then he would fumigate this from the inside by burning mosquito powder in the sugar mills, and thus stupefy all the mosquitoes on the island.

Miss Tarn wanted to know who would bear the expense. Mr. Hoff thought that the government might, if only the natives would send in a petition to that effect. It was easier to get native names to a petition than to gather strawberries in June. And yet, knowing the utter worthlessness of such documents, government officials were ready to consider them. If Mr. A. had a grudge against Mr. B., he got up a petition and sent it to the government, praying for Mr. B.'s discharge.

Encouraged by attention from some of the learned members, Mr. Pelton asked for permission to make another suggestion. While Dr. Krane was speaking, he (Pelton) was interested in the hydraulic principle employed by the mosquito. It had been well said by some one that great ideas come from small things, for, at that moment, the details of a great invention had invested his brain-nothing less than a machine for extracting the saccharine principle from town gossip. Necessarily it would be by the diffusion process. He could not give a description of the invention here; to name it was enough-the Hawaiian Quadruplex Pan-Circulatory Begrundified Diffusion Mill.

Mr. Frylea wanted to know whether mosquitoes bit each other or not. A knowledge of the fact might be useful in the pulpit, where there seemed to be a need of subjects of interest. We ought to be willing to do as much for the

ministers as the railroads do. An acquaintance of his had preached through thirteen barrels of sermons, and he was beginning again at the first. He claimed that it was a good way to remain orthodox, and about the only way, as no change from the old style could be made to suit the demands of a progressive age. He selected the sermons on Thursday of each week, not in human weakness but through divine agency. The Lord knew what kind of a sermon his people needed on this particular Sabbath; and there were thirteen barrels of subjects, each one treated under three divisions. He first read a chapter in the Old Testament, then communed with his spirit, then he shut his eyes as if to plunge over a precipice, rammed his hand down into the barrel as far as it would go, and brought up a manuscript. This he reviewed for Sunday, picking out hymns to suit, in much the same way that Shakespearean mottoes are chosen for cook-books. This pastor stayed with his congregation fortyfive years before the Lord delivered them out of their afflic. tion. Not many were like his acquaintance, at least until they got a few sermons ahead. If we knew that a mosquito bit his brother, it would show that the smaller a thing is, the meaner it is; and if it didn't bite, we might see how much superior this seemingly useless creature was to those men and women who backbite. This was the ordinary method of inculcating religious truths; it works both ways. "You'll be damned if you do, You'll be damned if you don't."

He wished to know if the mosquito bit the lower animals.

Dr. Mickydoo replied that the lowest animal she had been known to attack was the chicken, and so disastrous were the effects that death often closed the scene. In Missouri, between moments of professional haste, when his office was full of patients and his two fine horses stood steaming at the door, when for three successive nights he was too busy to sleep, when the lame and sick came begging for only a

professional glance, he still felt able to observe that mosquitoes bit horses.

A member wanted to know if the Klub had ever heard of the "gallinipper," a mosquito belonging to the South. He had lived in the Southwestern States, and knew this species intimately. They were very large and noisy, and, by the way, he thought Mr. Burr would enjoy the music they made. He did not know how true it was, but he had heard that at a certain class meeting in Gallatin six gallinippers so disturbed the meeting by shouting "Amen" in a rasping voice that the exhorters had to bring the exercises to a close. It seems that any one addicted to the use of alcoholic beverages or onions will never be attacked by a gallinipper. In Clay County there is so much liquor consumed that no mosquito ventures within two miles of the county line; the only one that ever came near fell in a drunken stupor at Independence. The speaker said that he had seen none in Hawaii, but he believed that even the gallinipper would come with annexation.

Mr. Milkswell, a heavy student of damp soils, who had lost his fortune on the Mosquito Coast, now made a report of some special scientific work he was doing for the Klub. The members had voted sixty cents toward original investigation, and that was given grudgingly. Mr. Milkswell said that it did not matter what the results were, if the experiments could be made. This was the day of research, and thousands of dollars invested in apparatus and a properly qualified chemical investigator like himself was money wel spent. This was the true scientific spirit. It always cost money. Usually, however, the fact that a scientist stood back of a vegetable product, watching its career, giving it advice, publishing reports about it, and nudging it in the ribs, as it were, gave it renewed courage, and the result was larger crops. Once he examined the soil at the foot of a papaya tree, and read his report before the Papaya Packers' Association. At once the tree began to bear, and now fruit

hung from the roots to the top, a distance of forty feet. On his arrival at the Hawaiian hotel years ago, he had mentioned that the soil of Hawaii was adapted to the lantana; now the islands are covered with it. So much for suggestion.

He had examined the blood of 5,000 mosquitoes with brilliant results. According to the best methods he had placed his results so that they could be determined. The tables showed which blood mosquitoes liked best, thus establishing a basis for valuable deductions:

Mr. Brofy wondered if this fact had any political signifiPresident Dole thought it had not. Mr. Smith said some might try to make political poi of it for the natives.

cance.

Mrs. Josh Andrews asked if the mosquito might not have a mission similar to that of the Avenger! Was it not possible for each mosquito to be a personified Nemesis, always coming to the right person to sting him for some sin? Her husband thought that. There was some suggestion of theosophy in it. She thought it would be pleasant to be able to say after each bite: "Another sin atoned." It would be like counting off beads on a rosary. There would be real evidence of having accomplished something by prayer. A system of prayers without means of checking off one item, of keeping up invocation without replies or receipts, was, to say the least, discouraging.

Dr. Mickydoo now pronounced the benediction, and the meeting adjourned.

(To be continued.)