SILKWORMS 115 



longer than the other four. From the heads came out 

 two very long pointed antennae, composed of many and 

 many knots. These flies, like the first, as soon as they 

 were born, emitted a white substance, and lived four days. 

 I observed, however, that when these worms found on 

 this plant transform themselves, contracted in an egg 

 [pupa], the egg becomes smaller than the worm and 

 when from the egg the fly comes out, it is very much 

 bigger than the egg, to such a point that it seems impossi- 

 ble that it can have got into it. So one can believe that 

 it was very much crowded in it, and cramped. Because 

 my brain gives me little help in describing exactly these 

 small animals I send them to you drawn, and in their 

 own and natural size, and enlarged also by an ordinary 

 microscope of those of only one glass. 



But as I have not been able to observe, as stated, that 

 the mulberry tree engenders silkworms, still less can I 

 expect to see them breed in the decayed flesh of a mule, 

 fed for twenty days on mulberry leaves. This fabulous 

 belief has been elegantly described by the distinguished 

 poet, Girolamo Vida, who sings in imitation of Virgil : 



Quod si spes generis defecerit omnis ubique, 

 Seminaque aruerint lovis implacabile ira; 

 Sicut, teneri reparantur caede iuvenci/' etc. 



I do not know what to say about this, but I do know, 

 by experiment, that the flesh of a kid, which had been 

 fed on mulberry leaves alone, for twenty days, did not 

 produce anything but worms, that were transformed into 

 gnats. I know also that worms breed in rotten mul- 

 berries, but always on condition that insemination has 

 taken place previously, otherwise, as before stated, noth- 

 ing will be produced in plants, carrion, or any other life- 



