4 INSECT TRANSFORMATIONS. 



Him, much reluctant, with o'erpow'ring force. 

 They bind; his mouth and nostrils stop, and all 

 The avenues ef respiration close; 

 And buffet him to death: his hide no wound 

 Receives; his batterd entrails burst within. 

 Thus spent they leave him; and beneath his sides 

 Lay shreds of boughs, fresh lavender and thyme. 

 Thi^ when soft zephyr's breeze first curls the wave, 

 Anaprattling swallows hang iheir nests on high. 

 Meanwhile the juices in the tender hones 

 Heated ferment; and, wondrous to behold. 

 Small animals, in clusters, thick are seen. 

 Short of their legs at first: on filmy wings, 

 Humming, at length they rise; and more and more 

 Fan the thin air; 'till, numberless as drops 

 Pour'd down in rain from summer clouds, they fly.' 



Trapp's Virgil, tieorg. iv, 369. 



Columella, a Roman writer on rural affairs, after 

 directing in what manner honey is to be taken from 

 a hive by killing the bees, says, that if the dead bees 

 be kept till spring, and then exposed to the sun among 

 the ashes of the hg-tree, properly pulverised, they may 

 be restored to life. 



These fancies have evidently originated from mis- 

 taking certain species of flies {Syrphi, Bombylii, 

 &c,) for bees, which, indeed, they much resemble in 

 general appearance ; though they have only hvo 

 wings, and short antennce, while all bees have four 

 wings, and long antennae. ISeither the flies nor the 



. Comparative figures of a bee (a) and a sj rphus (b). 



bees are produced by putrefaction; — but as the flies 

 are found about animal bodies in a state of decom- 

 position, the ancients fell into an error which accurate 

 observation alone could explode. The maggots of 



