358 Mr. W. S. MacLeay on the Insect 



first insect, which Linnaeus considered to be the CEstrus of the 

 ancients, appears to have been a species of the modern genus 

 Asilus, probably the Asilus crabroniformis, as we learn from his 

 Lachesis Lapponica. This was a gross error ; and he soon rec- 

 tified it, as he thought, by adopting the opinion of Valisnieri. It 

 is not indeed unlikely that some of the ancients* should, like 

 Valisnieri, have seen the perfect insects of the modern CEstrus 

 flying about cattle, and that they should have witnessed the 

 extraordinary agitation which they produce : but however this 

 may be, they certainly appear to have always confounded such 

 insects with the more common Tabani ; for it is the modern Ta- 

 banus, or some genus extremely near to it, that they have always 

 described as the oio-t^os. 



I shall take this opportunity of quoting a passage from Mouf- 

 fet, which proves that he was acquainted with the modern genus 

 CEstrus, although he did not confound it with the ancient otffr§og. 

 The passage will also show us how valuable is the information 

 sometimes to be procured from this obsolete work ; since, if we 

 connect it with what Reaumur has said of the CEstrus equi, we 

 have almost the whole economy of this interesting insect : 



" His proximfe accedit alia musca bobus et jumentis interdiu 

 sole fervido infesta, quam Pennius Curvicaudam sive a-xoXiovfov 

 jure appellat. Semper enim cruribus aut ventri jumenti insi- 

 dens, caudam versus ipsam recurvam tenet et spiculum exertum 

 quo ad percutiendum cauda sit paratior {^(irri§ov om<rd6xeiiT§ov). 



* Aristotle was not certainly one of these ancients ; for he could never have seen a 

 female of the modem CEstrus, as appears from his stating that no dipterous insect has 

 its sting placed behind. It seems however to have escaped the notice of naturalists, 

 that this great philosopher was acquainted with, and has described the larva of one of 

 the modern family of (Estrida ; and, as is rather singular, precisely that larva which 

 Reaumur describes as infesting the fauces of the stag, but of which the perfect insect 

 remains still unascertained. — See Arist. Hist. Jnim. lib. ii. c. 18 ; and lieaum. torn. v. 

 67—77. 



Hanc 



