ABSTRACT
The louse is foremost among the many important and dignified things that are made the subjects of raucous humor by the ribald. The louse shares with us the misfortune of being prey to the typhus virus. If lice can dread, the nightmare of their lives is the fear of some day inhabiting an infected rat or human being. For the host may survive; but the ill-starred louse that sticks his haustellum through an infected skin, and imbibes the loathsome virus with his nourishment, is doomed beyond succor. The opinion of the learned Professor Handlirsch appears to be the one most generally favored among louse scholars. Modern lice consist of two closely related varieties: the biting lice, or Mallophaga; and the sucking lice, or Anoplura. In the development of the head louse into the body louse, there are many very interesting changes of habit.
