340 



FARMERS' REGISTER— SHINGLE MACHINE. 



FOR TEMPERING KNIVES AND SPRINGS. 



Knives? temper in damp oil. Then draw the 

 temper from the heat of a bar ol' iron by detjrees, 

 until you get it to a deep blue. Springs are to be 

 temjiered in oil, then to be oiled over, and the oil 

 burnt ofl' three dill'ercnt times over the blaze of 

 the fire. 



FLAGG S SHINGLE »IACIITNE. 



A machine for riving and drawing shingles, has been 

 recently broiiglit into use in New York of which the in- 

 ventor makes the following statement in the last New 

 York Farmer. 



It is one of the greatest labor saving machines 

 in this country; it performs its work to great per- 

 fection, and at a rate almost incredible to all who 

 have not seen it. It is very simple in its construc- 

 tion, and not liable to get out of order. By this 

 machine sixty shingles are made from the bolt or 

 block in one minute, being one a second, and more 

 perfect than can be made with a frow and draw- 

 ing knife, as they are usually made. The shin- 

 gles are of a true taper from butt to point, and 

 can be sliaved to any given thickness. Any tim- 

 ber that can be spHt with a frow can be worked 

 with this machme: pine, cypress, cedar, chestnut, 

 oak, ash, hemlock, or any timber that Avill rive or 

 split. 



ON THE GENERATION OF INSECTS. 



Prom Insect Transformations in tlie Library of Entertaining 

 Knowledge. 



It was universally believed by the ancient phi- 

 losophers, that maggots, flies, and other insects, 

 were generated from putrifyin^ substances. This 

 opinion continues to be held by uninformed per- 

 sons among ourselves; — though it would be equal- 

 ly correct to maintain, that a flight of vultures had 

 been generated by the dead carcass which they 

 may be seen devouring, or a flock of sheep from 

 the grass-field in which tiiey graze. Another 

 opinion, perhaps still more generally diffused, is 

 that caterpillars, aphides, and other garden insects 

 which destroy the leaves of plants, are generated, 

 propagated, or, at least, spread about by certain 

 winds or states of the air, mysteriously and inde- 

 finitely termed blight. The latter belief is, proba- 

 bly, not so easy of immediate refutation as the 

 former; — but, as we shall endeavor to show, it 

 seems to us to be equally erroneous. 



The small size of insect.s renders it somewhat 

 easy to pass off fanciful opinions regarding them, 

 since it is difficult for common observers to detect 

 mistakes; but similar notions have been entertain- 

 ed by writers of no mean reputation, respecting 

 eventhe larger animals. The celebrated Kircher, 

 for example, one of the most learned men of the 

 seventeenth century^, goes so far as to give the 

 following singular recipe for the manufacture of 

 snakes: — 



"Take some snakes," says he, " of whatever 

 kind j'ou want, roast them, and cut them in small 

 pieces, and sow those pieces in an oleaginous soil; 

 then, fi-om day to day, sprinkle them lightly with 

 water fi-om a watering-pot, taking care that the 

 piece of ground be exposed to the s]>ring sun, and 

 in eight days you will see the earth strewn with 

 little wormsj which, being nourished with milk dilut- 



ed with water, Avill gradually increase in size till 

 they take the form of perfect serpents. This," he 

 subjoins with great simplicity, " I learned from 

 having found in the countiy the carcass of a ser- 

 pent covered with worms, some small, others lar- 

 ger, and others again that had evidently taken the 

 form of serpents. It was still more marvellous to 

 remark, that among these little snakes, and mixed 

 as it were with them, were^certain flies, which I 

 should take to be engendered from that substance 

 which constitutes the aliment of the snakes*." 



Kircher's more shrewd and less fanciful con'es- 

 pondent, Redi, determined to prove this singular 

 recipe before he trusted to the authority of his 

 fi-iend. "Moved," he says, "by the authentic 

 testimony of this most learned writer, I have fre- 

 quently tried the experiment, but I could never 

 witness the generation of those blessed snakelets 

 made to handf." But though Reth could not, in 

 this way, produce a brood of snakes, his experi- 

 ments furnished an abundant progeny of maggots, 

 — the same, unquestionably, that the imagination 

 of Kircher had magnified into young snakes, — 

 which, being confined in a covered box, were in a 

 short time transformed into flies, at first of a dull 

 ash color, wrinkled, unfinished, and their wings 

 not yet urifolded, — as is always the case with wing- 

 ed insects just escaped from their pupa case. In 

 less than an hour, however, they " unfolded their 

 wings and changed into a vivid green, marvel- 

 lou&Ty brilliant" — most probably the green flesh-fly 

 (^3h(sca CcBsar. Linn.) 



It is a common opinion in this country, particu- 

 larly in the north, that if a horse's hair be put into 

 the water of a spring or ditch, it will be in process 

 of time transformed, first into a hair-worm, and 

 afterwards into an eel. The deception, as in the 

 instance of Kircher's snakes, arises from the close 

 resemlilance between a hair and the hair-worm 

 ( G or dins aquaticus, Linn.,) and between this and 

 a young eel. This fabled transformation of hair, 

 which we have heard maintained, even by several 

 persons of good education, is physically impossi- 

 ble and absurd. 



The method laid down by Virgil in his Georgics 

 for generating a swarm of bees is precisely of the 

 same descri])tion as the snake recipe of Kircher; 

 and though the "Episode of Arista^us recovering 

 his bees" has been pronounced to be "perhaps the 

 finest piece of poetry in the world," we must be 

 permitted to say that it is quite fabulous and un- 

 philosophical. The passage runs thus : — 



Oft from putrid gore of cattle slain 

 Bees have been bred. * * * A narrow place, 

 And for that use contracted, first they choose. 

 Then more contract it, in a narrower room, 

 Wall'd round, and cover'd with a low built roof. 

 And add four windows, of a slanting light 

 From the four winds. A bullocic then is sought. 

 His horns just bending in their second year; 

 Him, much reluctant, with o'erpow 'ring force 

 They bind; his mouth and nostrils stop, and all 

 The avenues of respiration close; 

 And buffet him to death: his hide no wound 

 Keceives; his batter'd entrails burst within. 

 Thus spent they leave him; and boiieath his sides 

 Lay shreds of boughs, fresh lavender and thyme. 

 This, when soft zephyr's breeze first curls the wave. 

 And prattling swallows liang their nests on high. 



* Athan. Kircher, Mund. Subterran. lib. xii. 

 t Redi, General, Insectorum, edit. Amstel. 1686, 



