\^OL. XLVII. LONDON. SKPTEMBKR, 1915 No. 9 



POPULAR AND PXONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY. 



Some Curious Old Beliefs About Insects. 



by harry b. \veiss, new brunswick, n. j. 



"Oft from the putrid gore of cattle slain 

 Bees haYe been bred .... A narrow place, 

 And for that use contracted, first they choose, 

 Then rriore contract it, in a narrower room, 

 Wall'd round, and covered with a low built roof, 

 And add four windows, of a slanting light 

 From the four winds. A bullock then is sought, 

 His horns just bending in their second year; 

 Him, much reluctant, with o'crpowering force, 

 They bind; his mouth and nostrils stop, and all 

 The avenues of respiration close: 

 And buffet him to death: his hide no wound 

 Receives; his battered entrails burst within. 

 Thus spent they leave him, and beneath his sides 

 Lay shreds of boughs, fresh lavender and thyme. 

 This, \yhen soft zephyr's breeze first curls the wave, 

 And prattling swallows hang their nests on high. 

 / Meanwhile the juices in the tender bones 



Heated, ferment; and wondrous to behold. 

 Small animals in clusters, thick are seen. 

 Short of their legs at first; on filmy wings. 

 Humming at length they rise; and more and more 

 Fan the thin air; 't 11 numberless as drops 

 Pour'd down in rain from summer clouds, they fly." 



Such is the fabulous, poetic method given by Virgil in his 

 Cieorgics for generating a swarm of bees. These erroneous ideas 

 of ancient naturalists, philosophers and poets were not by any 

 means confined to insects. For instance, Kirchcr, a learned man 



