GENERATION OF ANIMALS, III. ix. 



perfected. Of these creatures, the winged ones are 

 larger than those that walk. 



Another occurrence, which may well cause surprise 

 to manv people, is reallv quite regular and normal. 

 Caterpillars at first take nourishment, but afterwards 

 they cease doing so, the chrysalis (as some call it) 

 being motionless ; so too the larvae of wasps and 

 bees afterwards turn into pupae as they are called 

 [and have nothing of the sort]. This is not abnormal, 

 for an egg also, when it has reached the perfection of 

 its nature, does not grow, whereas to begin with 

 it does grow and takes nourishment, until its 

 differentiation is effected and it has become a 

 perfect egg. Some larvae contain in themselves 

 material from which as they feed on it residue is 

 produced," e.g.. those of bees and wasps ; others get 

 the material from Nsithout, as caterpillars and some 

 other larvae do. 



I have no^v stated why it is that it takes a threefold 

 generation ** to produce creatures of this sort, and the 

 cause which, after they have begun as mobile crea- 

 tures, makes them become immobile again. Also, 

 some of them are formed in consequence of copula- 

 tion, just as birds, Vi%ipara and the majority of fishes 

 are ; others are formed spontaneously, as certain 

 plants "^ are. 



" Cf. U.A. 551 a -29 flF. " the larvae of bees . . . and 

 wasps, while they are young, take nourishment and are seen 

 to have excrement " ; cf. also ibid, a 25. 



* See above, 758 a 28 et praeced. 

 ' e.g., the mistletoe, 715 b 28. 



' om. Z : ToiovTo 17 rpwfn) S : habent in se id quo cibantur 

 et eiciunt superfluitatem cibi L. 



* olov 01 Peck {sicut S) : 01 re vulg. 



331 



