Tales From The Amazon

The Amazon journals written by one of my ancestors were received to great acclaim when published in the nineteenth century. On going over his papers, I have recently discovered this excerpt, no doubt considered unfit for publication in that more innocent age. I here reproduce it word for word, and invite any comments you might see fit to make on these surprising discoveries.

Certain of the risks associated with swimming in the waters of the lower Amazon are well known. Beyond the larger predators - the saurians,

piranhas

, and giant catfish that can swallow an intrepid bather - are of course the many infections and parasites that infest the river, not least among them the slender

candiru

fish, capable of swimming up the urethra of its victims, where its backward pointing spines make removal almost impossible even after the creature has expired.

However, less has been written about those most pernicious denizens of the area, known in common parlance as the love leech and the lust leech.

Although not true leeches, these invertebrates share their namesake's gelatinous body form and habit of firmly attaching to the hosts that they seek to parasitize.

The more common is the love leech, to be found in the slow flowing eddies and small lagoons that abound between Manaus and Belém. Although the creature grows up to a length of some ten inches and a breadth of seven, with a weight of four or five pounds, its mottled brown colouration and stealthy habits make its presence almost impossible to discern in these turbid waters.

It is believed generally to float with the currents, but on detecting is prey in the water can propel itself over short distances with great speed and precision, by means of forcefully expelling water from its hollow body cavity, in the manner of a squid making its final attack.

However, this is no predator, but rather a parasite that has made its niche in the natural world obtaining nutrition from a most unusual source. Its preferred host is the male of any sufficiently large mammalian species, perhaps archetypally the deer and tapirs that are endemic to the region or the river dolphin; but today, as hunting has rendered such game scarce near the main stream of the river, it seems to have adapted perfectly to preying upon the most common creature to be found within its habitat: man.

Any adult male who chances to bathe in these waters is likely to learn suddenly of the presence of these parasitic invertebrates as one of them, perhaps after stalking its unknowing victim for some time, strikes unerringly at his male member. With rapid and muscular movements, it wraps itself around the entirety of his genitalia, the

membrum virile

being engulfed in the aforementioned hollow body cavity while the testes are grasped in a secondary cup or sac.

As the gentleman in question is likely to learn as he reflexively attempts to remove the invader, this sac is lined with small stingers akin to hypodermic needles, which are usually retracted inside fleshy sheathes but which constitute the creature's principal defence against the aggressions of its host. Any touch of the outside of the organisms skin will elicit an excruciatingly painful warning jab with these stingers, while violence or a prolonged attempt at removal leads the parasite to deliver venom sufficient to incapacitate the most resolute brave. In any event, the shock and pain of the first jab is usually sufficient stimulus to prevent the victim from making any further attempt to touch the creature that covers and engulfs his nether regions.

As soon as it has attached itself, limpet-like, to a suitable male, the love leech begins its feeding cycle. By subtle movements of the short, soft tentacles or protrusions that line its inner surface, combined with gentle contractions of the muscles of its body wall, the parasite rapidly induces the most extreme turgidity in even the most unsusceptible man. At that point it begins to exude a lubricating mucus from its inner membrane, while increasing both the force and rhythmic frequency of its muscular contractions.

As the stingers surrounding the testes render any interference impossible, ejaculation cannot be avoided; and it is from this remarkable source that the creature derives its nourishment. It greedily squeezes its body such as to propel the material to a toothless mouth located deep within its body cavity, even while it resumes its gentle massage in an attempt to prevent the usual post-coital reaction and induce a further dispensation of its favoured foodstuff.

Once the creature determines that its host cannot be coaxed into providing it with further nutrition - usually after a period of up to an hour, and anything from one to seven emissions - it detaches of its own accord and disappears back into its underwater den, where it digests its meal and awaits the arrival of another potential victim.

Such, then, in the love leech. Its attentions certainly cause a degree of inconvenience in any gentleman who would rather not be unavoidably detained for such a period, and no small embarrassment to one who is bathing with his fellows; but the experience is a short-lived one, and indeed maybe prized as a leisure source among certain tribes, where younger unattached males may closely guard the secret of the locations of lakes invested with the creatures.

However, in the lower stretches of the river, where it breaks into channels around great islands at the edge of the Atlantic, such activities are avoided by even the most headstrong, for fear of the related but far more unpleasant species, that known to all as the lust leech.

This second organism is clearly closely related to its kin, being identical in size and indistinguishable in physical appearance. Indeed, it has been suggested that the two species are one in the same, the only difference being one of behaviour and food source. Like its cousin, the latter species is formed around a hollow internal cavity lined with soft protrusions, and a sac on the anterior portion containing venomous stingers on its inner surface; and similarly, it shows remarkable ability both to grasp and latch onto its victims in short moments, and thence elicit an arousal which even the most worldly are powerless to control. It is perhaps yet more prone to make use of its poisonous spines to discourage even the gentlest touch on its outer surface, giving rise to an agony that makes any attempt at removal impossible.

However, the lust leech does not feed upon male ejaculate, but rather on the nutritious fluids emitted ceaselessly by the male member during the moments prior thereto. While it can only feed on smaller quantities produced in any given moment, this species is able to maintain its food source indefinitely.

The unlucky bather, under the finely-honed attentions of the creature's tentacles and the contractions of the muscles that fully surround his member, is drawn to the very edge of release; but, when his tormentor discerns that the stimulation has had the desired effect, and the secretions on which it feasts are being produced, it abruptly ceases all movement for a few seconds. During this time, any movement on the part of the host will meet with immediate retribution from the venomous flesh that engulfs his testes.

Following these moments of stasis, the lust leech senses that the immediacy of ejaculation has passed, and once again resumes its gentle ministrations, repeating the cycle endlessly.

The creature is amphibious, and able to coexist with its unwilling host for the duration of their lives. Some men are said to have been held in the tantalising state of arousal without release for a period of decades, going about their business unclothed to prevent any contact between their clothing and the sensitive outer surface of their tormentors, and with a hollow and hopeless look upon their countenances. It is truly tragic to gaze upon them, engaged in the menial duties allotted by their jeering companions, stopping still like statues every few minutes as a look of desperate hope comes over them, followed inexorably with a return to despair.

In some tribes, the parasite is applied deliberately as a punishment for the most heinous crimes, and it has been said to be used by married women whose eyes are turned to other men, in order to render their husbands incapable; under the traditions of these peoples, a man afflicted with such a creature has no right to divorce, and must continue to serve his wife's needs and provide for her, but must tolerate her taking other lovers even into their marital bed in order to offer that which her sire has had taken from him.

In one case, I heard of a man deliberately inflicting this terrible situation on his rival in love. Stealthily sneaking into the man's hut in the dead of night, he released the parasite alongside the sleeping figure, who awoke to find his fate already sealed. The female at the heart of the dispute was charmed at her suitor's ingenuity, and promptly took the aggressor as husband, while the victim retains his unwanted passenger to this day and is a figure of ridicule.