( ^78 ) 



From hence I concluded that the conllitution of thefe creatures whs 

 fo ordained by Nature, that this Maggot, in the middle of Summer, 

 w hen the atmofphere is very hot and the earth dry, does not undergo 

 any change nor lay its eggs ; for if thofe eggs were laid in hot and 

 dry earth, they would be foon dried up and become barren, whereby 

 the fpecies would be expofed to perifli. But, as thefe animals lay 

 their eggs in the month of September, when our lands are all wetted 

 with rains, the eggs, being laid in moill earthy do not dry up, but 

 remain fruitful. 



Having obferved that the animals I had put into a box in the 

 beginning of September, had laid fome eggs in it ; I did, in order 

 to prcferve them, put them into a box almoll filled with moift 

 fand, and covered them with more of the lame, and carried them 

 in my pocket for fourteen days, to give them warmth, and fee whe- 

 ther any Maggots would be produced from them, and I daily opened 

 fome of thefe eggs, but coidd not fee any appearance of young 

 within them. 



I often opened the bodies of thefe animals, both the males and 

 females, and was furprifed at the wonderful number of veffels and 

 organs they contained, infomuch that I muft fay, that the fpedacle 

 would excite more admiration than to view the inteftines of larger 

 animals with the naked eye ; and this was particularly the cafe in 

 the hind parts of the bodies of both males and females, which, 

 viewed through the microfcope, exhibited fuch a fpe6lacle, that I 

 never faw the hind part of the body of any animal, wherein were 

 fo many organs with their joints, the ufe of which, though doubt- 

 lefs efl'ential to the animal, are to us unknown. 



Since we fee now, as I have fiiid, that the female of this animal 

 can lay moi'C than two hundred eggs, it plainly appears, that if all 

 the animals of this fpecies which are bred in one fiimmer were to 

 increafe in the lame degree, within two or three years they would 

 fo multiply, as to devour all the roots of our grafs ; but by drought* 

 in the earth, great rains and ftorms, and fevere frofts, many of 



