THE SO-CALLED BUGONIA OP THE ANCIENTS. 491 



fly, from a rat-tailed larva, is, in comparison to E. tenax, of rather rare 

 occurrence, and would not have been noticed so easily and so generally. 



(3) The very common occurrence of Uristalis tenax, and (as I will 

 show in the paragraph about its geographical distribution) the truly 

 fabulous rapidity of its j)ropagation under favorable circumstances, 

 must have struck, from the earliest times, the eyes and the imagina- 

 tion of the ignorant crowd, and this obtrusiveness, combined with the 

 swarming of the fly round carcasses, and its bee-like aspect led quite 

 naturally towards the belief in the Bugonki. 



This thesis, that EristuUs tenax alone is the cause of the Bngonia 

 craze, being given, what remains for me to do is to show how, at the 

 end of those twenty centuries of inertia, the question about the Bugonia 

 came up again, and after some uncertainty and groping, found its solu- 

 tion in the recognition of that truth. 



A group of men, almost contemporaries, brought about that solution 

 in the seventeenth century, by dint of observing insects in life, and not 

 by merely comi)iling' authorities. These men were: Goedart (1620- 

 1668), Blankaart (his work appeared in 1688), Swammerdam (1637-1680), 

 all three in Holland; Eedi (1626-1(>97) and Vallisnieri (1661-1730) in 

 Italy, and Anally Reaumur (1683-1757) in France. 



Goedart {MetaDiorphosis imectoriini, etc., 1662; edition in Dutch 1669) 

 gives rough but distinct figures of the larva, pupa, and imago of E. 

 tenax [l. c, Tab. ii, p. 25). He calls the larva vermiculus porcinus. The 

 imago is distinctly figured as a two-winged fly, and the letterpress also 

 speaks of two wings; nevertheless, for some unknown reason, Goedart 

 calls it apis (bee). 



That so careful and conscientious an observer should have taken a 

 fly for a bee is out of the question. Swammerdam, who reproached him 

 with this mistake {Bibl. Nat. Germ., ed. 1758, p. 212), changed his mind 

 in another part of his work {I. c, p. 257), and took to task Dr. de Mey, 

 Goedart's commentator, as the guilty party. Goedart was not a class- 

 ical scholar; Eeaumur (vol. i, p. 29) notices it in a passage, which is a 

 choice specimen of French finesse and urbanity: " Ceux meme (les 

 naturalistes) qui, par une ignorance peut-etre lieureuse, n'etaient pas 

 en etat de lire les anciens, comme Goedart et Mile. Merian, ont travaille 

 utilement." It was the classically learned de Mey who saw in Goedart's 

 observation an actual case of Bngonia. He took the Eristalis for a 

 honey-bee, and composed a preposterous Annotation about it. Swam- 

 merdam, the representative of the new science, was seized with an 

 almost ludicrous fit of wrath about this piece of presunq)tion. " The 

 fuss, says he (/. e.) de Mey makes about this story is truly astonishing, 

 and plainly shows that he is equally ignorant of the nature of the bee, as 

 of the nature of the fly. This is one of the bad habits of our day that 

 statements are made on matters about which one knows nothing, for the 

 mere purpose of getting a reputation of Avisdom and knowledge.'' An 

 amusing instance of the collision between che old and the new learning. 



