130 THE PEACOCK BUTTERFLY. 
In the year 1780, Romberg noticed a shower of 
blood, that had excited universal attention, and 
which he could the more satisfactorily show to be 
produced by the flying forth and the casting of bees, 
as the phenomena in the place around the beehives 
themselves were remarkably striking. From this 
fact it is evident, that the appearance is attributable 
to other insects as well as the lepidoptera. 
We have many other records of showers of blood, 
which, no doubt, may he referred to the same 
source ; and it is worthy of remark, that these are 
invariably stated to have taken place in warm 
seasons of the year, when the papilionaceous tribes 
are most numerous. 
This provision in the physical habits of butterflies, 
is analogous to a similar process in other animals, 
and affords a satisfactory explanation of what has 
been looked upon as a prodigy, and as fearful prog- 
nostics of some approaching direful event. That 
which historians recorded as preternatural, is now 
stripped of its terrors, and is ranged among cireum- 
stances which happen in the common course of 
nature. These appearances, both in ancient and 
modern times, in the hands of wicked men, had a 
wonderful influence in farthering their base designs 
over the superstitious. 
