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SILK AND SILK PRODUCERS. 



By the Rev. W. W. Spicer, M.A., &c. 



iBead November 12th, 1877.] 



The employment of insects for the special purposes of mankind 

 may be placed under three principal heads, viz. , Medicine, Food, and 

 Clothing. With regard to the two first, one may almost write, as 

 did old Herrebow, the author of a Natural History of Iceland, the 

 72nd chapter of whose work runs thus — " Concerning snakes. 

 There are no snakes in Iceland." For it is quite astounding — when 

 we consider their number (not less than 150,000 species), and the 

 varied properties they possess — how few insects are pressed into 

 man's service either for curative or culinary purposes. In the 

 present day, Hygeia entrusts her reputation and the safety of in- 

 valids almost entirely to vegetable and mineral substances ; while, 

 as for the cookery book, we may search in vain for the name of an 

 insect among the myriad of delicacies, which pamper modern 

 appetities. 



But, if Science is reserved in the employment of insects in the 

 pharmacopoeia, ignorance and credulity have given full flight to 

 their fancy. 



" Fools have rushed in, where angels feared to tread." 



Had one of our ancestors a distressing toothache ? There were 

 ready at hand the weevil and the ladybird, either of which could be 

 crushed and applied to the afflicted ^Dart. Nay, did he wish to get 

 rid of the offending organ altogether, he had but to touch it with 

 the ashes of burnt "emmets or pismires,'' and straightway the tooth 

 would drop from the gum. Had he the misfortune to sprain his leg 

 or bruise his foot ? Two at least of the beetles, which dwell in 

 excrementitious matter, Geotrupes and Aphodius, were specifics 

 held in high estimation. The yellow matter wliich exudes from the 

 joints of the bilbeetle, was held to be as eflicacious in dropsy or 

 rheumatism, as in hydrophobia — and no doubt was so. Another 

 infallible remedy against the bite of a mad dog consisted of the fat 

 white maggots generated in the putrid carcase of the dog itself — 

 truly a case of Homceopathy run mad ! 



That foul disease leprosy could not stand before the bruised body 

 of a meal worm. The great jaws of the stag beetle when powdered 

 proved a certain cure in most of the maladies incidental to child- 

 hood. The difierent tree bugs were good against ague ; the male 

 cricket taken internally could drive away a cold. Was the cold 

 accompanied by headache ? There were plenty of remedies at hand, 

 such as earwigs and cockroaches. This last insect was specially 

 valuable ; for according to Dioscorides (whose receipt is unhesitat- 

 ingly reproduced by Mouftet in the I7th century), the fat of the 

 cockroach pounded with oil of roses is singularly efficacious in ear- 

 ache, and the same insect boiled in oil removes warts. Lastly, snake- 

 poison Avas rendered perfectly harmless, if the patient could be 

 induced to swallow one or two bed-bugs ! 



Civilised peoples have never been much in the habit of utilising 

 insects as food. The only example I know of is that of the Romans, 



