- 199 — 



The narrator of the tale arranges it so as to make it a 

 preamble to the riclclle: Wheii Samson gave the honey to his 

 parents he dici not teli them that he had takeii it from the body 

 of the lion; becaiise if he had tokl them, they (as believers 

 in the Bugonìa) woiikl have solved the riddle immediately, 

 without the necessity of guessing. The story therefore represeuts 

 a real occurrence, based upon a well-observed, but wrongly 

 interpreted, naturai phenomenon. 



It is curious to notice how Samuel Bochart (vok II, 

 p. 502) comments on this passage of the Book of Jndges in 

 order to meet possible objections. He admits that bees, besides 

 their naturai origin in hives, are produced from dead oxen, 

 in conformity to the opinion of numerous ancient authors; 

 but he scofifs at the ignorance of those who, relying on the 

 scriptural text, admit two kinds of animal-bred bees, and 

 attacks especially Moufet on that matter: « Nec audiendus 

 Mufetus Anglus (pii in Insectorum Theatro alias apes scribit 

 esse leoìitogenes, alias taurogenes. » In order to explain the 

 appearance of bees in Samson's lion, Bochart establishes three 

 propositions : 



1.° Although it is stated in the text that the bees were 

 in the carcass, it is not stated that they \vere boìm there 

 (« apes in leonis corpore fuisse repertas, non tamen ibi 

 natas » ). 



2.° That between the killing of the lion and the fìnding 

 of his remains a ivhole year had elapsed, because the expres- 

 sion « after a while » {post cliem) in Hebrew must be under- 

 stood to mean a whole year. A host of authorities are adduced 

 by Bochart to sustain this strange proposition. 



3.° That at the end of a year the corpse was reduced 

 to the state of a clean skeleton, in which the bees could take 

 shelter without repugnance, the bees being clean animals. 



But Bochart does not explain how those cleanly bees 

 which could not stand a rotten lion, could be born from 

 rotten oxen? 



