120 GENERATION OF INSECTS 



find satisfactory proof in the eggs attached to the feathers 

 of the royal eagle, the kestrel, and the cow-bird, which 

 is also a bird of prey; these eggs are much larger than 

 a grain of millet, hence the naked eye can discern them 

 and even see the well-formed lice inside, as I have fre- 

 quently done, thus learning what a weak foundation sus- 

 tains the statement of Aristotle, and with what slight 

 effort it may be overthrown. 



It might perhaps be affirmed, without doing injury to 

 the truth, that all kinds of living creatures are exposed 

 to this noisome pest, and as for Pliny, who wished to 

 exempt asses and sheep from it, I can excuse him, for 

 he relied on the report of another person, that is, he 

 believed in the statement of Aristotle, in the " History of 

 Animals," which statement was confirmed many centuries 

 later by Thomas Moufet, in his praiseworthy " Theatrum 

 Insectorum," in which, not wishing to refute the sayings 

 of that profound philosopher, and racking his brains for 

 an evasion of his dictum, he wrote that the ass does not 

 become lousy because of his natural disinclination for 

 exercise, owing to which he is rarely in a sweat. After- 

 wards, it occurred to Moufet that the above reason was 

 frivolous and of little weight, so he retreats to the last 

 refuge of logic,, namely, antipathy. In spite of all this 

 conjecture, it is a fact that the ass is subject to lice, and 

 I have reproduced these pests in the following pages, 

 together with those infesting the camel. The most ig- 

 norant shepherd knows that sheep are likewise troubled 

 with this vermin, and the Greek, Didymus, speaks plainly 

 on the subject in book eighteenth of his " Country Life." 

 And since his time, Jacob Alfiruzabadi names these 

 plagues in his great Arabic Dictionary, which was called 

 by the Egyptian title " Alcamus," that means Ocean. 



