NO EVIL WITHOUT ITS ADVANTAGE. 93 



Their size is hardly larger than that of our large 

 European ants, yet they are of such a consti- 

 tution that neither fresh nor salt water, nor vine- 

 gar, nor any other strong liquors, with which I 

 often covered the floor of my chamber, were able 

 to destroy them, so that every method I took to 

 extirpate the breed proved ineffectual." No evil is 

 without a counterbalancing advantage. Thus, our 

 enthusiast found a consolation for all his "swellings 

 and acute pains" occasioned by the hostilities of the 

 vag-vagues, since, thanks to the wakefulness they 

 induced, he had opportunities for making a repeti- 

 tion of experiments which he frankly acknowledges 

 " might otherwise have been performed but very 

 seldom." 



" My room," he says, " was full of pails of sea- 

 water, in which I constantly kept live fish, which 

 in the night-time emitted a light not unlike that of 

 phosphorus. The mugs full of shells, and even 

 the fish that lay dead on the table, gave the same 

 light. All these illuminations put together, and 

 reflected upon different parts of the room, made it 

 appear as if it were on fire ; and I must own that 

 I was of that opinion the first time I saw the 

 strange phenomenon. The vag-vagues, by awaken- 

 ing me suddenly out of my sleep, renewed my 

 fright much oftener than I could have wished in 

 the beginning ; but my apprehension gradually 



