82 Mr. Clark's Appendix to a Treatise 



depositing its ovum on the back of the beast. It is true, that Bruce in his 

 ' Travels in Abyssinia' has given the figure of a fly, which he supposes might be 

 the object alluded to by Moses ; but on referring to his figure (pi. 39), it has 

 no resemblance to this genus of flies, the Cuterebrce, but is rather, though with 

 something fictitious about it, allied to the genus Stomoxys, or perhaps Tabanus, 

 both of which genera are certainly silent flies in their attacks upon the cattle." 



In this historical part of my essay I would desire also to insert the follow- 

 ing passage : " We are informed by Festus Avienus, cited by Bochart, in his 

 work entitled ' Chanaan,' lib. i. cap. 39. p. 723, that Himilco, a Carthaginian, 

 had been sent by the senate of Carthage to discover the western shores and 

 parts of Europe ; that he successfully accomplished the voyage, and that he 

 wrote a journal of it, which Festus Avienus had seen ; and that in that jour- 

 nal the Islands of Britain are mentioned by the name Q^strymnides Insulce, 

 probably on account of their being greatly infested by the Q*}strum or Gadfly. 

 Which singular passage, if it can be relied upon, would appear to indicate 

 that, at this very early date, (perhaps the very first and earliest account of 

 these islands in existence,) our island was covered with immense forests- 

 abounding in cattle, which caused it to become the favourite resort of those 

 troublesome insects, so much so as to be a leading object of remark to those 

 adventurers." 



At page 5 of the above essay on the (Estri, I would desire to rescind the 

 following lines : " and believe that the agony the fly occasions in depositing 

 the egg in the skin will account suflSciently for the violent agitation of the herd 

 without this sound;" substituting for it the following: "A further and appa- 

 rently positive testimony has reached me, of an ear- and eye-witness, that the 

 female fly in depositing her e.gg does really accompany it with a noise most 

 frightful to the cattle. A Herefordshire farmer of my acquaintance informed 

 me last summer, that when he has been at plough, and especially about mid- 

 day, and with the sun shining bright and clear, he has repeatedly been sur- 

 prised in his operations by the arrival of this unwelcome guest, whose visit 

 caused him serious annoyance, the animals attached to the plough (oxen) be- 

 coming perfectly ungovernable and scampering off" with his machine. And he 

 further states, that he can with his lips imitate the noise these flies make so 

 exactly as to start a team of oxen by doing it near them. It is not an easy 



