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In the next place, I took out of the cavity of the belly of two 

 Herrings a white worm, about as thick' as a horfc-hair, whofe body, 

 at each end, efjjecially near the tail, was very thin and pointed. 

 This fpecies of worm I have found in the Itomach and bowels 

 of feveral kinds of filh. Thefe worms, I concluded, had forced 

 their way through the llomach or bowels, and thus had got into 

 the cavity of the belly, becaufe their bodies were of a very hard 

 texture. 



The circumftance, that thefe worms fliould penetrate, through the 

 inteftines into the cavity of the belly, may feem wonderful to many 

 perfons, who cannot conceive how a woimd can be made by a 

 worm in any inteftine, and yet the chyle not run out of that wound 

 into the cavity of the belly. But it fliould be confidered that the 

 head of this worm (which is very fliarp), piercing through the 

 inteftine, would caufe little or no injury to the part, becaufe 

 neither the head or body make much of a cut or wound, and, there- 

 fore, the veflels in its paflage would only be ftretched afunder, and, 

 immediately after it had palled, clofe again. 



A gentleman of my acquaintance, hearing me argue in this man- 

 ner, told me, that he kept, in an enclofed place at his houfe, 

 a parcel of hens, in order to fupply himfelf with eggs, and that his 

 maid fervants were accullomed to throw the fand andfweepingsof the 

 chambers into this place, without taking the trouble to pick out fuch 

 pins as might be in them, and that the hens, which were kept thus 

 Ihut up, finding no fmall ftones or pebbles to fwallow, as it is in their 

 nature to do, will pick up the pins. Thefe fowls are generally 

 killed in the winter-time ; and, my friend told me that, upon cut- 

 ting them up, himfelf and all his family, not excepting his men and 

 maid fervants, had feen feveral pins flicking in their breafls ; and 

 that, alfo, a pin was found which had come out from one of their 

 bodies through the breafl-bone ; and that another pin was found 

 in the bottom of the brealt, with its point downwards, flicking out 

 of the Ikin, lb that only the upper part of the pin remained between 



