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only a few days, in that time lays a multitude of eggs and then 

 dies: on the contrary, the Weevil, which every day produces but 

 few eggs, is a long lived animal, and by this means may be as pro^ 

 lific as Silk-worms or other infects : for the Weevils which 1 am 

 now treating of were all alive the preceeding fummer. 



As to the two maggots which I at firll found in the glafs among 

 the wheat, I had no doubt .hat they had fallen out of the giains 

 wherein they had been firfl depofited, by reafon that thofe grains 

 had been rather too much eaten away before the eggs were laid iiv- 

 them, and the holes which had been made in them rather too large ; 

 and, as all creatures, however minute, are endowed with moft ad- 

 mirable faculties and powers to ani'wer the ends of their creation, I 

 think it very probable that the large trunk or beak with which this 

 infe6l is provided, (furniflied with teeth or pincers,, which open and. 

 Ihut in exa6t correlpondence with each other,) is given to it of fuch- 

 a length that it may be enabled to bore a fmall deep hole in every 

 grain of wheat, and therein dcpofit an egg, otherwife the maggots 

 breeding from, thefe eggs would never grow to maturity : for if a 

 W^eevil were to lay its egg on the outfide of a grain, and a maggot 

 Ihould be hatched from it, fuch a maggot could not pofllbly pierce the 

 hulk of the wheat. Again, were a Weevil to lay more than one 

 egg in one grain, and all thefe eggs produced maggots, they would 

 hinder each other's growth, for want of having iufficient nourifh- 

 inent, inafmuch as one grain is not more than fufficient to nourifli 

 one maggot, and fo to produce one Weevil. 



I obferved in opening one grain in which a fmall hole had been 

 made, and out of which I took one fmgle egg, that round about that 

 part where the egg was placed, the mealy fubftance of the wheat 

 had been loofened or reduced to powder, from whence I concluded 

 that the parent Weevil, before it laid the egg, had by means of its 

 trunk, ieparated the particles of meal in that part, both to make a 



