124 THE PEACOCK BUTTERFLY. 



acquirements, had studied the habits and economy of 

 insects, was consulted on this momentous occasion. 

 On examination, he found the walls of a cemetery 

 near the place, as well as those of several villages, 

 spotted with large drops of a blood-red liquid. A 

 short time prior to this, he happened to pick up a 

 large chrysalis, which he had carefully laid up in a 

 box. Soon after its metamorphosis into the butterfly 

 state, he found that it had emitted a drop of blood- 

 coloured liquor on the bottom of the box, of the size 

 of a French sol. On comparing this with the spots 

 on the stones in the roads, and in the fields, he found 

 that they were identically the same ; and he then 

 unhesitatingly pronounced that they proceeded from 

 the same cause. His opinion was strengthened by 

 having observed, that prodigious numbers of butterflies 

 disported in the air at the time. He farther noticed, 

 that these miraculous drops of what the people 

 supposed bloody rain, were never found in the middle 

 of the town, and appeared only in places bordering 

 on the country ; and that they were not to be found 

 on houses higher than the ordinary flight of butterflies. 

 M. de Peiresc explained the phenomenon to many 

 curious and learned individuals, and established it as 

 an incontrovertible fact, that the imagined shower of 

 blood was in reality but the drops of a red liquid 

 emitted by the butterflies. The same idea seems to 

 have been entertained by Swammerdam, though he 

 does not appear to have verified it from personal 

 observation. 



Reaumur mentions an instance of a gardener at 



