510 • PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [^ANNO 1700. 



in tlic next ])l;ice, because they cannot arise from flesh ; for the worms that 

 sprin:^ fr(Mn the e<^irs of flies in flesh, wiiich we also call mites or fly-blows, are 

 fnlly grown in the space of 9 days ; but those which feed upon cheese require a 

 longer time for completing their growth, and flesh will not keep so long with- 

 out salting or smoking. It is probable therefore these flies lay their eggs on 

 cheese, which does not soon corrupt. 



Now we may imagine that the patient whose tooth threw out the worms by 

 smoking, had some time before eaten cheese laden with young worms, or eggs 

 of the above-mentioned flies, and that these worms or eggs were not touched 

 or injured in the chewing of the cheese, but stuck in the hollow teeth, and at 

 last insinuated themselves so far into the substance of the teeth, that they 

 gnawed the sensible parts, and so occasioned the great pain. It appears very 

 strange to me that smoke in the mouth or tooth should have such an effect as 

 to bring worms out of hollow teeth ; for I cannot conceive how the little worms 

 should have a respiration, to be so far prejudiced by the smoke, that they are 

 obliged to come forth. 



To satisfy myself on this point, I took a glass ball, the diameter of which 

 was almost 3 inches, with a little hole in it, about the width of a goose quill. 

 In this glass I put 10 cheese-worms of the largest sort, and twice or thrice 

 threw in burning brimstone on a slender piece of hemp ; and observed that the 

 burning brimstone did not at all injure the worms, so far as I could see; and 

 about an hour after the burning of the sulphur, I put the mouth of the glass to 

 my nose, and could still plainly perceive the smell of the sulphur. 



The living worm that you sent me I have kept still alive, and think it is 

 larger since I had it. I shall try to preserve it till it turns into a fly. These 

 worms have a hard and strong skin, and may last a long time. I remember 

 some years ago my late wife being much afflicted with the tooth-ache, com- 

 plained that the pain was such as if the flesh had been gnawed through. At 

 last she found benefit by dropping the oil of vitriol into the hollow tooth, which 

 I did with a glass instrument, that conveyed the oil to the tooth without in- 

 juring the muscles. 



Now it is possible she might have got one or more of these little worms in 

 the hollow tooth, at a time when she eat heartily of old cheese, which was 

 seized with whitish rottenness, and had a great many little worms in it which 

 she did not observe, though she fed often upon it. Upon this supposition the 

 pain might be occasioned by those worms, which were afterwards killed by the 

 oil of vitriol when we knew nothing of them. 



Sej)t. 7 J 1700. — The worm which you sent me, and that was still alive, I put 

 into a glass hermetically sealed at one end, and stopped with a cork at the other. 



