Mite, or Acarus, L. a genus of insects, consisting of 35 species, the principal of which is the Asiro, Common, or Cheese-mite. It is very small, and when first hatched, is so extremely minute as to be scarcely perceptible by the naked eye. Though principally infesting cheese, there are several varieties of this species, breeding in flour, meal, etc. and occasioning considerable injury. The most effectual method of expelling these noxious vermis, according to Leeu-wenhoek (who was indefatigably attentive to their generation and growth'), to place a lew nutmegs in the sack, or bin containing the flour; as the odour of that spice is insupportable to mitess which will thus be removed, without the meal acquiring any unpleasant flavour.- FunkE advises a cheaper remedy, consisting in the decorticated thick branches of the lilac or elder-trees, which are to be put in the flour, and will answer both as a preventive, and for their expulsion.

There are other species of mites, that breed in animals when unclean or filthy, especially in dogs, cows, etc. nay, even on insects— Nor is the human body exempt from their invasion, particularly when infected with the iten (of other eruptive disease), of which they are by many considered as the cause ; mites having been frequently found in the watery pustules vhich occasion that peculiar itching senstion. In dysentery, also, these' vermin have been ejected with the feces; whence it is evident that they live and prey on the interior parts of the system.