CHAP. V. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 169 



and flies : but yet I shall tell you what Aldrovandus*, 

 our Topsel, and others, say of the PALMER-WORM, or 

 Caterpillar : That whereas others content themselves to 

 feed on particular herbs or leaves ; (for most think, 

 those very leaves that gave them life and shape, give 

 them a particular feeding and nourishment, and that 

 upon them they usually abide ;) yet he observes, 

 that this is called a pilgrim, or palmer- worm, for his 

 very wandering life, and various food, not contenting 

 himself, as others do, with any one certain place for his 

 abode, nor any certain kind of herb or flower for his 

 feeding ; but will boldly and disorderly wander up and 

 down, and not endure to be kept to a diet, or fixt to a 

 particular diet. 



Nay, the very colours of caterpillars are, as one has 

 observed, very elegant and beautiful. I shall, for a 

 taste of the rest, describe one of them ; which I will, 

 some time the next month,she w y oufeeding on awillow- 

 tree, and you shall find him punctually to answer this 

 description : his lips and mouth somewhat yellow ; his 

 eyes black as jet ; his forehead purple ; his feet and 

 hinder parts green ; his tail two-forked and black ; the 

 whole body stained with a kind of red spots, which 

 run along the neck and should er-blade, riot unlike 

 the form of St. Andrew's cross, or the letter X, made 

 thus cross-wise, and a w hite line drawn down his back 

 to his tail ; all which add much beauty to his whole 

 body. And it is to me observable, That at a fixed age, 

 this caterpillar gives over to eat; and, towards Winter, 

 comes to be covered over with a strange shell or crust 



the 26th of May \ perceived a few ; but the 27th, 28th, 29th, and 30th, 

 it was a sight very surprising and entertaining, to see the rivers teeming 

 with innumerable pretty nimble flying animals, and almost everything 

 near covered with them; when I looked up, the air was full of them as 

 high as I could discern, and seemed so thick, and always in motion ; 

 [the air he tells you, but he means the flies ;] the like it seems when one 



<c looks up, and sees the snow coming down. And yet this wonderful 



" appearance, in three or four days after the last of May, totally disap- 



" peared." 



* Ulysses Aldrovandiis, a great physician and naturalist of Bologna : he 



wrote 120 books on several subjects, and a treatise De Fiscibus, published 



at Franckfort, 164O. 



