2l8 TiMEHRI. 



the glittering visitors, tied them into shining festoons 

 and hung them before the altar where the Blessed Sacra- 

 ment still remained. Then tents were pitched, watch 

 fires lighted and sentries posted, and the first French 

 colonists lay down and slept peacefully on Canadian soil. 

 The Spanish discoverers on returning home did not fail 

 to enlarge on the wonders of the fireflies in the newly 

 found lands. PETER Martyr's account of what he learnt 

 on the subje6l from the voyagers is so curious that I 

 quote it at length :— " In Hispaniola and the rest of the 

 Ocean Islands, there are plashy and marish places, veryfit 

 for the feeding of herds of cattle. Gnats of divers 

 kinds, engendered of that moist heat, grievously affli6l 

 the colonies seated on the brink thereof, and that not 

 only in the night, as in other countries : therefore the 

 inhabitants build low houses, and make little doors 

 therein, scarce able to receive the master, and without 

 holes, that the gnats may have no entrance. And for 

 that cause also they forbear to light torches or candles, 

 for that the gnats by natural instin6t follow the light, 

 yet nevertheless they often find a way in. Nature hath 

 given that pestilent mischief, and hath also given a 

 remedy, as she hath given us cats to destroy the filthy 

 progeny of mice, so hath she given them pretty and 

 commodious hunters, which they call cucuy. These be 

 harmless winged worms, somewhat less than backs (bats) 

 or reere mice, I should rather call them a kind of beetles, 

 because they have other wings after the same order, 

 under their hard-winged sheath, when they leave flying. 

 To this living creature (as we see flies shine by night 

 and certain sluggish worms lying in thick hedges) provi- 

 dent nature hath given 4 very clear looking glasses ; 2 



