3 
The original cause of this delusion lies in the fact that a 
very common fly, scientifically called Lristalis tenax (popularly 
the drone-fly), lays its eggs upon carcases of animals, that its 
larvae develop within the putrescent mass, and finally change 
into a swarm of flies which, in their shape, hairy clothing and 
colour, look exactly like bees, although they belong to a totally 
different order of insects. Bees belong to the Order Hymenoptera, 
and have four wings; the female is provided with a sting at 
the end of the body; the fly Hristalis belongs to the Order 
Diptera, has only two wings, and no sting. 
The final extinction of this absurd notion among’ civilized 
nations was due to two causes: 
1.° among scientific men, to the confutation of the old 
belief in spontaneous generation, and the general recognition 
About Shakespeare’s natural history there is an interesting article in the 
Quarterly Review, April 1894: Shakespeare’s Birds and Beasts. On p. 362 the 
author concludes by saying: ,His animated nature, that is his knowledge of 
natural history cannot be, and could not have been better than Ilizabethan.“ 
There is an old work: Letters on the Natural History of the Insects men- 
tioned in Shakespeare’s Plays, with incidental notices of the Entomology of 
Treland. By R. Patterson, Treasurer of the Nat. Hist. Soc. of Belfast. London, 
W.S. Orr & Co. Paternoster Row, 1838. (There is also a later edition of 1842, 
see Hagen’s Biblioth. Entom. I, p. 31.) 
In this work the above-quoted passage from ,,Henry IV“ elicits the follow- 
ing remark: An observation which will naturally recall to your mind the passage 
in which we learn from the Scriptures that Samson found ,a swarm of bees and 
honey in the carcase of the lion.“ But seldom as any thing of the kind does 
occur in this kingdom, it did happen on one occasion in the County of Down, 
if some species of wasp was not mistaken for bees. The fact is recorded in the 
following words, extracted from the Belfast News Letter of Friday, 10t? Aug. 
1832. ,A few days ago, when the sexton was digging a grave in Temple Cranney 
(a burying-place in Porta-Ferry) he came to a coffin that had been there two 
or three years, which he thought necessary to remove, to make room for the 
corpse about to be interred. In this operation, he was startled by a great num- 
ber of wild bees, issuing forth from the coffin, and upon lifting the lid, it was 
found that they had formed their combs in the dead man’s skull and mouth, 
which were full. The nest was made of the hair of the head, together with 
shavings that had been put in the coffin with the corpse.“ 
(I owe this extract to the kindness sf Mr. W™ Fr. Kirby, of the British 
Museum. The insect was evidently a wasp; a bee does not build its nest“ of 
hair and shavings.) 
