392 
The Animal-Lore of Shakspeare’s Time. 
likewise for purple, which, is betweene red and tawny ; and is much in 
use at this day in Europe. The poet surnameth it red, because it is 
found that it hath a more high colour, and that which he addeth (that 
it groweth without tillage) may be understood according as I have 
expounded; except a man will say, that there is another graine of that 
name which commeth of it selfe: for I know not, whether the other pro¬ 
ceeding from the bodie of a creature, may take root and fructifie.” 
(Learned Summary on Du Bartas, p. 86.) 
Cherm.es, or kermes- grain, from the Arabic word kir- 
miran, was the name given to the Coccus ilicis, an insect 
found on the ilex or evergreen oak, a tree growing in the 
south of Europe. Our word crimson is derived from this 
obsolete name, kermes. 
Queen Mat was indebted to the insect 
tribes for her dainty chariot and “ team of 
atomies: ”— 
“ Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners'* legs, 
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers, 
The traces of the smallest spider’s web. 
The collars of the moonshine’s watery beams. 
Her whip of Cricket’s bone, the lash of film. 
Her waggoner a small grey-coated gnat, 
Not half so big as a round little worm 
Prick’d from the lazy finger of a maid ; 
Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut, 
Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub. 
Time out o’ mind the fairies’ coachmakers.” 
{Borneo and Juliet, i. 4, 59.) 
The cricket was often confused with the cicada of 
the ancient Greeks, especially by those writers whose 
knowledge of natural history was derived mainly from 
classical sources. We should probably be correct in sub¬ 
stituting the word cicada for the grasshopper in the follow¬ 
ing remarkable piece of information. The main value of 
the passage, however, is to show the extreme credulity of 
the narrator. Giraldus Cambrensis writes:— 
“ In the districts of Apulia and Calabria there are grasshoppers 
with wings, which spring from place to place not by any effort of 
