h ANIMALCULA OF INFUSIONS. S^ 



ice-houfe, but without ever feeing them become 

 torpid ; and they uniformly periflied on remain- 

 ing expofed any confiderable time. He thence 

 concludes it impofTible that this bird becomes 

 F 2 lethargic 



^ Nine more were confined in an ice-houfe : they lan- 

 gulflied without becoming lethargic, infenfibly lofl their 

 llrength, and died in 41 hours. Thefe animals did not 

 perifh from hunger, for others lived without food three 

 days, three and a half, and five days, while the moft vi- 

 gorous in the ice-houfe lived only 48 hours. Thus, the 

 acceleration of death can only be afcribed to privation of 

 heat.'— A. 



Thefe experiments very much elucidate the nature of 

 fwallows in one refpecS, but they are not quite fatisfadory. 

 The author ftems to think that intenfe cold does not ac- 

 tually produce lethargy. If this is the cafe, It mud be 

 admitted, that all the fwallows named here leave Britain 

 m autumn and return in fpring ; and that we have no 

 proof as yet, that any birds taken torpid from the earth, 

 caverns, rocks, or walls, were really fwallows. 



It is not evident whether the author retains his opinion 

 in the text, that fwallows have been drawn torpid from 

 water. This has been fupported by learned men. It is 

 admitted in a late tract: by Fabricius on the winter fl^ep 

 of animals. 



All the experiments on fwallows are related in the au- 

 thor's hiilory of thefe birds. Neither that, nor his hiftory 

 of Owls and Eels, in the fame volume, are yet tranflated 

 into Englifti, fo far as I know. — T» 



