OF NATURAL HISTORY. 229 



pigeon, and applied to It a thin flice of beef, in which there 

 were hundreds of maggots. The portion of beef was not 

 Aifficient to maintain them above a few hours. He fixed it 

 to the thigh by a bit of gauze •, and he prevented the pigeon 

 from moving, by tying its wings and legs. The maggots 

 foon fhewed that their prefent iituation was difagreeable to 

 them. Moft of them retired from under the flice of beef ; 

 and the few that remained perifhed in a fhort time. Their 

 death was probably occaiioned by the degree of heat in the 

 pigeon's body being greater than their conftitution could 

 bear. Upon the fame pigeon M. de Reaumur performed 

 another experiment. He took ofF the flvin from its thigh, 

 laid bare the fleHi, and applied immediately another flice of 

 beef full of maG^Gfots. The animals difcovered evident marks 

 of uneafinefs ; and all of them that remained on the fleili of 

 the pigeon were deprived of life, as in the former experi- 

 ment, in lefs than an hour. Thus the degree of heat that Is 

 neceflary to fuch vrorms as inhabit the interior parts of ani- 

 mals, is defl:ru6live to thofe fpecies which Nature has deftin- 

 ed to feed upon the flefli of dead animals. Hence the worms 

 fometimes found in ulcerous fores, mufl belong to a dilierent 

 fpecies from thofe upon which the above experiments were 

 made. 



The growth of fome worms, which feed upon anim.al or 

 vegetable fubftances, is extremely rapid. Redi remarked, 

 that thefe creatures, the day after they efcaped from the egg^ 

 had acquired at leaft double their former fize. At this pe- 

 riod he weighed them, and found that each worm weighed 

 feven grains •, but that, on the day preceding, it required 

 from twenty-five to thirty of them to weigh a fingle grain. 

 Hence, in about the fpace of twenty-four hours, each of 

 thefe v/orms had become from 155 to ^210 times heavier 

 than formerly. This rapidity of growth is remarkable in 



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