238 INSECT TRANSFORMATIONS. 



worms would naturally produce similar insects to 

 their parents; whereas they are either oviparous, as 

 Goetze affirms, or, as Bremser thinks, ovo-viparous;*^ 

 both agreeing that they are not transformed into 

 flying insects. Reaumur made the more plausible 

 conjecture, that they might be introduced by eating 

 tench and other fish, in which they are known to 

 abound ;'f but, independently of their being destroyed 

 by heat in cooking, this has been subsequently dis- 

 proved by experiment; for M, Deslonchamps says, 

 that '■ when animals are fed for some time on in- 

 testinal worms (EnfoDzarm) alone, and then killed, 

 they are not found infested with these worms.';); 

 Valisnieri and Hartsocker suppose, without a^hadow 

 of proof, that worms are transmitted from parents 

 to children like other hereditary disorders ; while 

 the late M. Lamarck refers their production to ' the 

 march of nature in the production of all living 

 beings !'§ This indefinite doctrine is also held by 

 Geotfroi St Hilaire, Cuvier, Blumenbach, and other 

 distinguished living naturalists; but we think it more 

 philosophical and more manly, in such obscure cases, 

 at once to confess our ignorance of the ways of nature, 

 and to wait for further observation, than to frame idle 

 theories, supported only by vague analogies and doubt- 

 ful facts. 



It may not be uninteresting to mention, however, 

 that upwards of 1200 species of intestinal worms 

 have been discovered; and probably there may be 

 twice as many more of whose existence nothing is 

 yet known. Sixteen of these species have been 

 found in the human body; the rest are peculiar to 

 other animals. 11 Some of the more singular species 



* Bremser, Uber Lebende Wifrmer in leb. Mensch. 

 t Letter to Bonnet, CEuvres, vol. iii, p. 344. 



I Diet. Classique, vol. viii, p. 589- 



^ Anim. sans Vertebres, vol. i, p. 15. 



II Diet. Classique, vol. viii, p. .593. 



