106 BRITISH APHIDES. 



I.— REPRODUCTION OF APHIDES. 



" If this Essaye were worthy judged of, it might not greatly please 

 the common and vulgar spirit, and as little the singular and excellent. 

 The first will understand but little of it, the latter overmuch." — Michael 

 dc Montaigne, cap. liv. 



1. GENERAL OBSERVATIONS. 



A geeat part of the interest attaching to the Aphis 

 family is connected with their double mode of repro- 

 duction ; a process represented by the terms gamic and 

 a-gamic. It is true that when once this unexpected 

 fact was substantiated by early biologists, it was dis- 

 covered that the non-intervention of the male was of 

 more frequent occurrence amongst the lower animals 

 than was at first recognised. The discovery, indeed, 

 was not quite so new as was at first assumed. 



The philosophic Aristotle appears to have had some 

 indistinct notion of a like phenomenon ; and he seems 

 to suggest something akin to non-impregnation in his 

 remarks on the development of the egg of the drone 

 or male bee. 



\\\ Earvey commented upon and corrected the 

 opinions of Aristotle and Fabricius, and declared 

 against spontaneous generation. He did this very 

 decidedly in the words " Omnia omnino animalia 

 etiam vivipara, atque hominem adeo ipsum, ex ovo 

 progigni;" and again later, " Cuncta animalia quodum 

 modo ex ovo nasci affirmavimus." 



In another passage, however, he seems to admit the 

 current doctrine of production of worms by putre- 

 faction, as an exception.* 



* Vide W. Harvey, 'Omnia opera* 4to, 1766, p. 182, and p. 482. 

 Also article " Harvey," ' Encyclopaedia Britanica.' 



