The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1854-03-13
THE DAILY DISPATCH.
THE ENEMY OF THE LEECH

Everything has its enemy-the smallest
and the greatest of the animal creation, it
appears, are doomed to suecumb to the pc
culiar enemy designed by Providence for
each and every one. The feebler and lesser
animals are multiplied with the greatest ra-
pidity; and as animals rise in the scale of
power and domination, their capacity of null
tiplication, as general thing, is diminished.
| So that, by wise provision of Nature the
more powerful animals, which are ablest to
| defend themselves and require most for their
support, increase slowly, while the weaker
| and the lesser, which are easiest put out
OF the way and go to furnish food for their
suoeriors, multiply much faster Man, who
is king and tyrant over all, and has in most
other animals foe, yet finds his greatest
enemy in himself With him famine and
disease are not enough, and when in any part
OF the globe he becomes blessed with great
increase of numbers and great prosperity,
he is sure to go to WAR, and thus does him
self more than all his enemies combined can
do, to diminish his race and bring distress
upon the nations. 1t would appear that as
man was the greatest OF all the animal race,
some extraordinary means should be employ
ed to keep down his numbers and hold his
multiplication in check, as no other animal
on the globe could be relied upon for the
performance Of this necessary part of the
economy of nature. Hence this propensity
to war upon his fellow, implanted in his
breast; and hence to aid him in his amiable
efforts to assist Nature, the devil has intro
duced sundry auxiliaries, such as alcohol and
various vices, which, with his own labors
are likely to accomplish all that Nature can
desire in the way of depopulation, to prevent
redundancy of that race which is at once
the best andmeanest of all the animal world
The state of hostility which exists among
animals OF higher grades is fully equalled
among those of the lower orders, down to the
yeriest insects. We find that, by some re-
cent investigations of Partisan savan,
even the Leech has its enemy, and is himself
victim, and that instead of being an unmiti-
gated blood-sucker, who deserves no pity, he
assumes the character of a martyr, and is
doomed to slow and painful DEATH tortured
as he fingers, by the fangs of an insect tyrant,
who is himself without pity, and who cannot
be shaken off. Poor Leech what a hard
case his is, to be sure
The Leech, which is so invaluable an aid to
the physician is growing rarer and more ex
pensive daily and efforts have been made to
naturalist them in France, in order to in
crease the supply But owing to some cause
hitherto undiscovered these efforts in a great
degree failed. NJ Souberain made an expe
| riment with the view of finding out the cause.
He formed a basin and placed in it aquatic
plants and clay, ndsuppliedit with fresh water
from a jet d eau. In this basin he placed three
hundred Hungarian leeches, in the month of
April. In September he examined the basin
and found only one hundred young leeches,
mostly hidden in the leaves of the plants, and
attached to each was a small, pale insect,
with a fiat, elongated body This insect
was found in great numbers in the basin
and is very common in the waters of the
Seine and in the stagnant pools about Paris.
nj. Souberain placed a few of them in a Jug
and threw in some young leeches They i'm
medately fastened upon the leeches, which
were speedily overpowered. He next tried
the same experiment with some old leeches,
and they were seized upon also, and all their
efforts to shake their assailants off were una
| vailing. Naturalists call this insect the Soft
water Asellus. NJ. Souberain concluded that
it was utterly impossible to propagate leeches
unless the water containing the Asellus could
be kept from them-a thing very difficult in
Paris, and attended with considerable ex-
pense.
We have condensed this statement from a
long account which gave minute description
OF the scourge of the leeches. 1t has implant-
ed In our breasts much sympathy for the
leech, and the first time we need little local
depletion, we shall give him a little blood
without reluctance