4 INSECT TRANSFORMATIONS. 



Him, much reluctant, with o'evpow'ring force. 

 They bind ; his mouth and nostrils stop, and all 

 The avenues of respiration close ; 

 And buffet him to death : his hide no wound 

 Receives ; his batter'd entrails burst within. 

 Thus spent they leave him ; and beneath his sides 

 Lay shreds of boughs, fresh lavender and thyme. 

 This, when soft zephyr's breeze first curls the wave, 

 And prattling swallows hang their nests onliigh. 

 Meanwhile the juices in the tender bones 

 Heated ferment ; and, wondrous to heholdy 

 Small aniniiils, in clusters, thick are seen, 

 Short of their legs at first : on filmy wings, 

 Humming, at length they rise ; and more and more 

 Fan the thin air ; 'till, numberless as drops 

 Pour'd down in rain from summer clouds, they fly. 



Trapp's Virgil, Georg. iv. 369. 



Columella, a Roman writer on rural affairs, after 

 directing- in what manner honey is to be taken from 

 a hive by killing; the bees, says, that if the dead bees 

 be kept till spring, and then exposed to the sun 

 among the ashes of the fig-tree, properly pulverised, 

 they may be restored to life. 



These fancies have evidently originated from mis- 

 taking; certain species of flies (Syrphi, Bombylii, 

 &c.) for bees, which, indeed, they much resemble in 

 general appearance ; though they have only two 

 wing?, and short antenna?, while all bees have four 

 wings, and long antennae. Neither the flies nor the 



Comparative figures of a bee (a) and a syrphus (6). 



bees are produced by putrefaction ; — but as the flies 

 are found about animal bodies in a state of decom- 

 position, the ancients fell into an error which accurate 

 observation alone could explode. The maggots of 



