n European weed naturalized in southwestern United States and Mexico having reddish decumbent stems with small fernlike leaves and small deep reddish-lavender flowers followed by slender fruits that stick straight up; often grown for forage
n slender threadlike roundworms living in the blood and tissues of vertebrates; transmitted as larvae by biting insects
Thus far Government sanitary brigades have only sized up the enemya kind of filaria or threadworm, whose eggs are spread from victim to victim by gnats.
It sucks a sleeper's blood, and with it some filaria larvae.
Another type of filaria, mosquito-borne, is widely prevalent in the West Indies, causes elephantiasis, grotesque swelling of the arms, legs, buttocks, sexual organs.