( ^8i ) 



thofe animals, the outward huflcs, or (liells, may be expanded and 

 burft open, and the meal which they contain, having by this means 

 -te pailage opened to quit its covering, may be diffolved, digefled, and 

 converted into nutriment. 



To inveftigate this more fully, I took a glafs tube, about the fize of 

 a finger, and clofed at one end ; into this I put fome grains of Wiieat 

 and Barley, with a fufficient quantity of water, and then applied fo 

 much heat to it, as, in a fliort time, made the water boil. Then, upon 

 examining the Wheat and Barley, I obferved, that their hufks, which 

 before, had been as it were clofely folded or clofed together, were not 

 now, broken or torn afunder, but, in the places where the grains had 

 been contrafted and turned inwards, the parts had now receded ei- 

 ther way, caufing the hulk to gape open, fo that, in fome of the 

 grains, a part of the meal was vifible, and in others the whole con- 

 tents were laid open. Some of the grains of Wheat, however, I ob- 

 ferved, which hadfwelled to three times their original fize, the hufks 

 remaining entire. 



After this, I examined the dung of fome hens, which, in the time of 

 a deep fnow, were kept fliut up in a coop, and fed with nothing but 

 "barley, which, it is well known, they fwallow whole. And, in the dung 

 of thefe fowls, I was much furprized to find nothing obfervable, ex- 

 cept a great number of pieces of the hufks of barley ; and I was at 

 a lofs to comprehend, how fo great a quantity of meal as thofe hufics 

 had contained, could have entered into the bodies of thefe fowls, con- 

 fidering that they were all full grown. 



Farther, I infpefted the dung of many fparrows, in which I found 

 a great number of very fmall hairs, clofely compa6fed together, in 

 a kind of regular order; together with many fragmcn^^s of the hufks 

 of Wheat and Barley. I at firft wondered what thefe hairs might be, 

 till 1 recolleded the hairy or reed-like parts at the extremities of the 

 grains of corn, which I have before defcribed, and found thefe to be 



