178 UTILITY OF THESE FLIES. 



" I '11 follow, Sir. But first, an't please the Gods, 

 I '11 hide my master from the flies, as deep 

 As these poor pickaxes can dig-." 



Cymbeline, Act IV, Sc. II. 



Ferdinand, when he avows his passion for Miranda, 

 says, I 



" would no more endure 



This wooden slavery, than I would suffer 

 The flesh-lly blow my mouth." 



Tempest, Act III. Sc. I. 



And, not to multiply quotations unnecessarily, 

 Shakspeare points out still more distinctly and un- 

 equivocally the connexion between the fly and the 

 maggot, when he says — 



" these summer flies 



Have blown me full of maggot ostentation." 



Love's Labour Lost, Act V. Se, II. 



Although our larders now and then suffer a little 

 from the attacks of these flesh-flies, the benefits they 

 confer outweigh a thousand times the injuries they 

 occasion. They are the great preservers of the 

 purity and salubrity of the air, by their instrument- 

 ality in consuming carrion, which, if left to decay by 

 the decomposition of its particles, would taint the 

 atmosphere around. To fit them the better for this im- 

 portant dut}', they are gifted with astonishing powers, 

 both of growth and of production. Tlie young of 

 one species {Musca carnaria) attain their full size in 



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