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2. THE TURNER SAVAGE. 

 SPHEX SPIRIFEX. 



Plate 4. 



Charatter of the Species. 



The Body is join'd to the trunk by a long fmall thread. 



The Antlers have ten joints ; and they fpread out, and grow fmall 

 to the point. 



The Feet are jointed, and equally hairy j and have each two toes. 



This ftrange disjointed creature, as it feems, lives, by choice, among 

 men, whom it never offends ; but it is beyond meafure terrible 

 to the lefler infects : and by the fabricaturc of its dwelling, it might 

 become an object of furprife and wonder ; tho' there were nothing 

 more to recommend it to our notice. 



I received this particular Fly from Peterborough in Northampton- 

 fhire, where it had form'd its cells in the mud-wall of a fmall cot- 

 tage, juft under the edge of the thatch; dry, warm, and fhelter'd 

 from the weather. 



The preceding kind lives in a mere cave of its own making ; 

 a fimple, oval hole, with a fmall opening, and larger within : this had 

 turn'd its dwelling in a clofe fpiral form, and polim'd the infide fo 

 well, that it had the afpect of one of the fpiral (hells we fee in ca- 

 binets, when faw'd open : about the mouth of this, was form'd a 

 kind of funnel, covered with legs and wings of flaughter'd Infects ; 

 and juft within this mouth ufually fat the inhabitant watch- 

 ing what came by; for the ftrange ftructure of his body made him 

 lefs fond of flying far ; left half of it fhould be left behind him. 



Befide the aftonifhing havock of this creature among the Infects, 

 on which it preys, there is a part of its hiftory ftrangely replete 

 with horror : it has been obferved, that while the Savages are fo 

 destructive of other creatures, they have a wonderful attention to 

 their young ; and this, by a courfe of Providence unknown to us, 

 any more than by the term inftinct, appears in all their actions, even 

 before thofe young are born, 



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