,1 INSECTS. 



ducted; for, supposing the flesh not to be abso- 

 lutely fresh or recent when first put into the vessel, 

 it is by no means improbable that some animal's 

 eggs might have been deposited upon it before the 

 experiment was made; in which case they would 

 undoubtedly hatch in the vessel, and thus lead to 

 a fallacy. The flesh therefore must be perfectly 

 fresh and well examined before it be put into the 

 vessel. Still however an objection might be made 

 on account of the legions of microscopic animal- 

 cules which would probably appear, if the fluid 

 parts of the flesh, even in the closed vessel, were 

 accurately surveyed*. 



The ancients, exclusive of the former erroneous 

 notion, entertained an idea that Insects were desti- 

 tute of blood; for which reason they called them 

 animalia exsanguia or bloodless animals ; but 

 this idea arose merely from their not having paid 

 that minute attention to the study of Nature which 

 distinguished the philosophers of the last and pre- 

 sent century; and particularly to their not having 

 had the advantage of the microscope. Insects are 

 now well known to be so far from bloodless ani- 

 mals that in many of them the circulation itself of 

 the blood is most clearly and distinctly perceived. 

 The blood of insects differs from that of the larger 

 animals chiefly in colour, since in most insects it 

 wants redness, being generally of a clear or watery 



* We must also admit that some kinds of the cellular or 

 hydatid taeniae might have taken up their abode in the flesh, and 

 these, to a person inconversant in Natural History, might appear 

 an argument in favour of equivocal generation. 



