MEMOIR OF SWAMMERDAM. 35 



powerful glasses. The after part of the day, and 

 usually no small portion of the night, were spent in 

 registering his observations and writing out a detailed 

 account of them, as well as in finishing his drawings. 

 Such was his enthusiasm that he often used to wish 

 that he had hut one year of perpetual light and heat, 

 to enable him to work without interruption. The 

 whole of this laborious task, too, was executed while 

 in a state of great bodily infirmity, and amid mental 

 distractions arising from a cause to which we shall 

 have immediate occasion to advert. Of the treatise 

 resulting from these exertions, Boerhaave affirms, 

 that all the ages from the commencement of na- 

 tural history to his time, have produced nothing 

 equal nothing to- compare with it. It is, certainly 

 deserving of the highest commendation for inde- 

 fatigable research, minute and accurate descrip- 

 tion, and elaborate delineations of internal organs. 

 Indeed it may be said to have laid the foundation 

 of an accurate and philosophical history of the Bee, 

 and at the same time to have contributed largely to 

 advance our knowledge of the structure of insects 

 in general. When we consider how many interesting 

 particulars Swammerdam brought to light, it will not 

 appear surprising that several singular facts escaped 

 his observation. The comparatively ample knowledge 

 we now possess of the subject is due to the accumu- 

 lated labours of many different individuals, and it 

 might have been much more limited than it is had it 

 not been for the happy expedient of employing glass 

 hives, a thing which had not been thought of in Swam- 



