36 METAMORPHOSES. 



fact, with his limited knowledge on these subjects, so very preposterous. 

 It is even possible that some of the wondrous tales of the ancients were 

 grafted on the changes which they observed to take place in insects. The 

 death and revivification of the phcenix, from the ashes of which, before 

 attaining its perfect state, arose first a worm ((moA??!), in many of its parti- 

 culars resembles what occurs in the metamorphoses of insects. Nor is it 

 very unlikely that the doctrine of the metempsychosis took its rise from 

 the same source. What argument would be thought by those who main- 

 tained this doctrine more plausible, in favour of the transmigration of souls, 

 than the seeming revivification of the dead chrysalis? What more probable 

 than that its apparent re-assumption of life should be owing to its receiv- 

 ing for tenant the soul of some criminal doomed to animate an insect of 

 similar habits with those which had defiled his human tenement ? 1 



At the present day, however, the transformations of insects have lost 

 that excess of the marvellous, which might once have furnished arguments 

 for the fictions of the ancients, and the dreams of Paracelsus. We call 

 them metamorphoses and transformations, because these terms are in 

 common use, and are more expressive of the sudden changes that ensue 

 than any new ones. But, strictly, they ought rather to be termed a series 

 of developments. A caterpillar is not, in fact, a simple but a compound 

 animal, containing within it the germ of the future butterfly, enclosed in 

 what will be the case of the pupa, which is itself included in the three or 

 more skins, one over the other, that will successively cover the larva. 

 As this increases in size these parts expand, present themselves, and are in 

 turn thrown off, until at length the perfect insect, which had been con- 

 cealed in this succession of masks, is displayed in its genuine form. That 

 this is the proper explanation of the phenomenon has been satisfactorily 

 proved by Swammerdam, Malpighi, and other anatomists. The first-men- 

 tioned illustrious naturalist discovered, by accurate dissections, not only 

 the skins of the larva and of the pupa encased in each other, but within 

 them the very butterfly itself, with its organs indeed in an almost fluid 

 state, but still perfect in all its parts. 2 Of this fact you may convince 

 yourself without Swammerdam's skill, by plunging into vinegar or spirit of 

 wine a caterpillar about to assume the pupa state, and letting it remain 

 there a few days for the purpose of giving consistency to its parts ; or by 

 boiling it in water for a few minutes. A very rough dissection will then 

 enable you to detect the future butterfly ; and you will find that the wings, 

 rolled up into a sort of cord, are lodged between the first and second seg- 

 ment of the caterpillar ; that the antennae and trunk are coiled up in front 

 of the head ; and that the legs, however different their form, are actually 

 sheathed in its legs. Malpighi discovered the eggs of the future moth in 

 the chrysalis of a silkworm only a few days old 3 , and Reaumur those of 

 another moth (Hypogymna dispar) even in the caterpillar, and that seven 



1 "A priest -who has drunk -wine shall migrate into a moth or' fly, feeding on 

 ordure. He who steals the gold of a priest shall pass a thousand times into the 

 bodies of spiders. If a man shall steal honey, he shall be born a great stinging 

 gnat : if oil, an oil-drinking beetle ; if salt, "a cicada ; if a household utensil, an 

 ichneumon fly." Institutes of Menu, 353. 



2 Hill's Swamm. ii. 24. t. 37. f. 2. 4. 



3 De Bombyce, 29. 



