146 Zoological Society. 



swarm of bees, alighting on him in hundreds and drinking his blood. 

 The animal thus bitten pines away and dies, at periods varying from 

 a week to three months, according to the extent to which he has been 

 bitten.'* . . . . " The next day one of my steeds died of the ' Tsetse.' 

 The head and body of the poor animal swelled up in a most distress- 

 ing manner before he died ; his eyes were so swollen that he could 

 not see, and in darkness he neighed for his comrades who stood feed- 

 ing beside him *." 



The Marquis di Spineto, in a memoir published " On the Zimb of 

 Bruce as connected with the Hieroglyphics of Egypt f," endeavoured 

 to ascertain the characters of this insect, and came to the conclusion 

 that it belongs to the order Diptera, notwithstanding Bruce says that 

 it very much resembles the Bee genus, and that it has " several of the 

 properties of the Bombylius, the Tabanus, the (Estrus, and the Hip- 

 pobosca, without belonging to any of them. In some of its generic 

 and even specific characters it is like the Bombylius and CEsh'us, in 

 others like the Hippobosca and the Muscidce, in a few like the Taba- 

 nus and the Dog-fly, whilst in the aggregate it differs from every one 

 of these insects." The Marquis points out the various relationships 

 which the insect, as described by Bruce, presents to these different 

 genera, considering that the porrected hairs or bristles foi^ming the 

 mouth "perform the office of suckers, simply because it does not lay 

 its eggs in the flesh of animals ; for according to the account which 

 Bruce gives of the evils attending the attacks of this fly, the bosses 

 which are produced swell, break and putrefy, but never exhibit any 

 larvae or maggots," thus differing from the habits of the (Estri ; to 

 which however he adds, by some curious misconception, that " the 

 larvce of the (Estrus live in wood, which does not seem to be the case 

 with the Zimby 



The Marquis however identifies the Zimb with the \\.vv6\ivia or 

 * Dog-fly' of the Greeks, the *Tsal tsalya Kelb' of the Alexandrian 

 Church, the *Af an ouhor' of the ancient Egyptians, the *Arob' or 

 *Oreb' of Exodus viii. 21, and the * (Estrus' of Aristotle; and con- 

 siders that it is the precise species of fly which caused the fourth of 

 the plagues of Egypt J. As such, he also regards it as the insect 

 represented on the Egyptian monuments at the head of the cartouches 

 which enclose the hieroglyphical titles of the Pharaohs, and as a sym- 

 bol of Lower Egypt (where only the insect occurs), the preceding 

 figure being intended for a sceptre, in contradiction to the opinion of 

 M. ChampoUion, who regards the figure of the insect as that of a 

 bee ; and consequently the signification of the two symbols as that of 

 "King of an obedient people." I can by no means however agree 

 with this opinion of the Marquis Spineto, since an examination of 

 various Egyptian monuments in the British Museum and elsewhere 



* Five Years of a Hunter's Life in the Far Interior of South Africa, ii. pp. 220, 

 227. 



t Lond. and Edinb. Phil. Mag. 1834, vol. iv. p. 170. 



X In the Article "Musquitoe" (Brit. Cyclop. Nat. Hist. iii. 299), I have sug- 

 gested various reasons for supposing that the fourth plague of Egypt was caused 

 by some species of Culicidee, which, although not disproved, are certainly weakened 

 by the knowledge now obtained of the real habits of the I'setse or Zimi. 



