64 GENERATION OF INSECTS 



to the sun in an open glass vessel. In a short time they 

 grew wormy, the worms being transformed as usual 

 into black eggs [pupae], from which, after an interval 

 of fourteen days, an equal number of large, striped flies 

 came out. As Father Kircher had stated that scorpions 

 are reborn from dead scorpions themselves, if exposed 

 to the sun and sprinkled with sweet basil and water, I 

 risked a second and a third experiment, only to be dis- 

 appointed and to await in vain the desired young scor- 

 pions, instead of which I always got flies ; and when at the 

 fourth attempt I saw neither worms, flies nor scorpions 

 I was still further strengthened in my opinion that no 

 animal of any kind is ever bred in dead flesh unless there 

 be a previous egg-deposit. 



This was a favorable opportunity for proving the state- 

 ment of Batista Porta, that the toad is generated from 

 a duck putrefying on a dung-heap. Three experiments 

 with this material brought no result, hence I was con- 

 vinced that Porta, otherwise a most interesting and pro- 

 found writer, had been too credulous. And Avicenna was 

 none the less so, for he would have it that women's hair, 

 lain in a damp and sunny place, would turn into snakes. 

 Now, I believe that snakes are only generated by means 

 of coition, and all other kinds of serpentine creation, 

 from rotten matter, or by other process mentioned by 



writers, are utterly false. 



******** 



The story of Kiranis, that the tun-fish thrown up by 

 the sea on the shore of Libya produces worms, that 

 change to flies first, then to grasshoppers, and finally 

 to quails, is not to be credited. No one in these days 

 would be so ignorant or so stupid as not to laugh at such 

 tales. Still, though I am, as you know, accounted the 



