WASPS' STINGS [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR, With
reference to Sir W. Beach Thomas's notes in the current issue of the Spectator, a personal experience may be of interest to your readers. Owing to the generosity of the Town Clerk of Smethwick, who gave the land for the purpose, a Children's Camp has been " run " by the Smethwick Education Committee from July to September of this year on virgin woodland country at Bewdley (Worcs.) adjoining the Wyre Forest. Sixty children (ages 12-14) of both sexes were in Map for ten weeks—each party of sixty staying for one fortnight.
During the greater part of the ten weeks, wasps abounded in and around the camp—so much so that it became impossible at one time for a dish of jam to be put on the table in the marquee where the children had their meals—the jam dish being a seething mass of wasps almost immediately.
We had—at a very modest estimate—over fifty cases of wasp stings and the unfailing remedy administered was a small piece of cotton wool soaked in ammonia liquid, lightly " dabbed " on the place where the child had been stung. That this remedy—when applied as soon as possible after a " sting " —proved efficacious may be judged from the fact that I cannot remember any case of a child complaining of the after-
effects of a sting.—I am, Sir, &c., G. F. BENNETT. 419 City Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham.
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