DIRECT BENEFITS DERIVED FROM INSECTS. 309 



To the Diptera order, as a source of food, man can 

 scarcely be said to be under any obligation ; the larva 

 o£ Musca putris, which is so commonly found in cheese, 

 being the only one ever eaten — a dainty as some think 

 it, of whom you will perhaps say with Scopoli, " qui- 

 bus has delicias non invideo^y 



The order Aptera, now that the Crustacea are ex- 

 cluded, does not much more abound in esculent insects 

 than the Diptera. The only species which have tempted 

 the appetite of man in this order are the cheese-mite 

 (Acarus Siro) — lice, which are eaten by the Hottentots 

 and natives of the western coast of Africa, who from 

 their love of this game, which they not only collect 

 themselves from their well stored capital pasture, but 

 employ their wives in the chase, have been sometimes 

 called Phthii'ojjhagi '^ — and another tribe which you 

 will think even more repulsive than the last, I mean 

 spiders. These form an article in Sparrraan's list of 

 the Boshies-man's dainties'^; and Labillardiere tells 

 us that the inhabitants of New Caledonia seek for and 

 eat with avidity large quantities of a spider nearly an 

 inch long (which he calls Aranea educis), and which 

 they roast over the fire*^. Even individuals amongst 

 the more polished nations of Europe are recorded as 

 having a similar taste; so that, if you could rise above 

 vulgar prejudices, you would in all probability find 

 them a most delicious morsel. If you require prece- 

 dents, Reaumur tells us of a young lady who when she 

 walked in her grounds never saw a spider that she did. 



* Scop. Carniol. 337. " Lat. Hist. Nat. viii. 93. 



" Sparrman, i. 201. ** Voyage A la recherche de la Peroiae, ii. 240. 



