hills, are not attacked by Scolopendra alone; they likewife ferve for food to many forts of larve with fix feet.

PAGE 98, 1. 21.

The hairy caterpillars. The tree bugs attack indifferently all forts of caterpillars; and I have even seen some of them feize upon butterflies, and fuck their fluids.

PAGE 93, 1. 26.

Flies are alfo found. That a large fly fhould kill and eat a fmall one is not very fingular; but it is more furprising to fee flies, that are apparently very weak, attack and overcome voracious flies much larger than themtelves. This however is done by a fly which in fize, and form, refembles the Panorpa. I have feen it in the air dart upon a dragonfly ten times larger than itself, and bring it to the ground. The fuccefs of the combat was not doubtful. The dragonfly thought of nothing but efcape, while the other stung it fo forcibly, that it would foon have been finished, had not the defire of poffeffing them both made me interfere. H loft them both, but it was eafy to fee by the flight of the dragon-fly, that it had been very rudely treated in the en

counter.

PAGE 98, 1. 28.

The ichneumons kill spiders. I do not know that there is more than one species of Ichneumon that kills fpiders. But I know for certain, and I believe I have already mentioned it, that there are many kinds of them which prey on o other infects.

PAGE 98, 1. penult..

Beetles feed on the aphides. Thefe have three forts of enemies ftill more formidable, to wit, the fmall ichneumons, the larvæ that feed on the aphides, and the Hemerobius. Thefe two laft, of which there are many fpecies, destroy a prodigious number of aphides.

PAGE 99, 1. 23

* No other nourishment than the fluids they fuck. It has been thought that spiders only fuck the juices of the infects they kill, becaufe they do not eat them entirely; but Lifter thinks that they alfo eat the folid parts. De Aran. P. 44.—In li

quido, &c. "In the liquid and whitifh excrement of this fpider, there were feveral black particles to be obferved, which were the ufelefs and indigeftible fkins of beetles and flies; it is not therefore probable that thefe animals live by mere fuction, but that they alfo devour a great part of their prey.

PAGE 99, 1. 33:

* Some drink, as grafskoppers. This fact was known to the antients Grafshoppers drink the drops of dew that adhere to leaves, after having firft examined them with their antennæ.

PAGE 100, 1. 20.

Continue at reft during the day. This ftate of reft is carried to fuch a degree, that many fpecies of Phalænæ give no figns of life, even when they are touched in the day. But the evening no fooner arrives, than they are almost in perpetual motion.

PAGE 100, 1. Jaft.

They Spring upon it with amazing velocity. I have feen a fpecies of 1pider do this. It forms a mall cavity in the fand which it lines internally with a kind of filk to prevent fand from falling in. It lies in wait at the mouth of this hole, and when a fly lights near it, even at the distance of three feet, it runs out upon it with aftonishing velocity, feizes it, and drags it to its den.

PAGE 101, 1. 7.

*The manner in which they kill. The large hornets lay hold of fpiders and caterpillars by the neck, and grap them in fuch a manner as to prevent them from being able to defend themfelyes, and fo transport them to their holes : if the infect feized makes ftill too much refiftance, a fecond application of the hornet's maxillæ foon finishes the combat. The Author.

Wafps, and especially hornets, do not content themfelves with wounding fpiders with their teeth before carrying them away. I have often feen them dart into the webs of the largest iders, and after having thrown them on the ground tear away their legs, and fy off with the mutilated trunk. Lyonet.

PAGE ICI, 1. 15.

Secure them as in a granary. Among the infects which feed in winter, thofe only which live on fubftances not to be found in that feafon, ufe the precaution mentioned by the author. It is eafy to believe that thofe which feed on rotten ftraw, or dead leaves and grafs, make no magazines, but eat thofe fubftances where they find them.

PAGE 101, 1. 32.

The proportion is fo well preferved. This proportion however is not always conftant. Circumftances favourable to certain forts of infects, make them fometimes appear in fuch multitudes, that after having devoured all the verdure fitted for their nourishment, the greater part die for want. Thofe only which have been firft hatched efcape and preferve the fpecies for the coming year; this is what makes it yery uncommon to fee a too great quantity of insects of the fame fpecies for two years running.

PAGE 102, 1. penult.

Have received a fort of pump. There are many kinds of voracious infects, that have at firft fight neither mouth nor probofcis, nor any apparent opening through which it can be suppofed that they can draw their nourishment. One would almost imagine that they live on air, if two large pincers in the form of a crooked horn, which they have on their head, did not indicate that they feed on fomething more folid. Thefe pincers ferve them for both mouth and trunk; they are hollow, and pierced or cleft at their extremity. They plunge thefe into the bodies of those animals they live on, and fuck through them the whole fubstance of their prey.

PAGE 103, 1.7.

Real Epicures, I know caterpillars that in less than four and twenty hours eat double their own weight.

But an example of gluttony much more remarkable is in thofe drones, which even when cut through the middle do not cease to gorge themselves with honied liquors if set before them, although what they fwallow runs out at the ound.

*The Dermeftes lardarius is fo voracious, that though fometimes there is feen hanging from him a ftring of ex

crement

crement, a yard long, he does not give over eating.Fritch.

PAGE 103, 1. penult.

Difpenfe with food. Add, or to live on what they can find, during winter.

PAGE 107, 1. 28.

Difgufis their enemy. A few years ago, as I was touching the horn of a certain caterpillar, which has one on its back, it turned about its head fuddenly, and difcharged upon my hand a quantity of a green liquor, vifcid, and fo fetid, that though I feveral times washed my hand with foap, and rubbed it with fulphur, I could not get rid of the fmell for two days.-The Author.

That infects, in order to rid themfelves of an enemy, fhould discharge, either by the mouth, or their posterior extremity, a fluid of an offenfive fmell, is not furprising. Nature furnishes us with examples of the fame kind, in fome of the larger animals, and the food ufed by infects, procures them the matter ready formed. But to find, that Nature has likewife taken care to provide, in many infects, a great number of refervoirs, having their orifices on the upper part of their bodies, and which contain a fetid liquor, ready to be discharged on all affailants, one would not fo readily expect. I know large caterpillars, producing Tenthredos, which, when they are teazed, eject to a good diftance, from different parts of their body, a disagreeable fluid, fit to put to flight their aggreffors. Various forts of larvæ which produce beetles have, upon their body, many different rows of tubercules, open at the extremity, and when they are touched, there appears at the end of these tubercles, a drop of milky juice, of the moft infupportable fmell. Thefe drops, however, feem to be very precious to them; no fooner does the danger difappear, than they take care to draw it in again, by the same channels through which it iffued. What a firange method of defence! But, it is not altogether peculiar to infects, for we find an inftance of it in thofe lizards which have been called Salamanders, though they are by no means able to live in fire. These reptiles, when they are preffed fomewhat rudely, or when they are brought

near

near a fire, fuddenly contract their fkin, and a white vifcid liquor iffues through its pores, by which they endeavour to drive off their enemy, or to defend themfelves from the heat.-Lyonet.

PAGE 111, 1. 35.

*Wrap them up, as in a cloak. There are little yellow caterpillars, with a red band, which live on the hundred leaved rofe, that weave a web round their eggs, and then die. The Author.

. What M. Leffer takes here for the eggs of caterpillars, are coques made by the larvæ of an ichneumon. Caterpillars never lay eggs, till they are metamorphofed into perfect infects.-Lyonet.

PAGE 112, 1. 10.

*Defend them by various ways. The Grille-talpa depofits its eggs in a hole it makes in the middle of a pretty hard hillock of carth. It furrounds this hillock with a kind of ditch, to make the approach to its neft the more difficult.— There it watches continually, and from time to time takes a circuit round, to fee that all is fafe. Reaumur Tom 1. Mem. I. The Author.

Although the facts mentioned here, are to be found in Reaumur, they are not confirmed by that illuftrious author. He only cites them from Goedart, and confiders them merely as a pretty fable.-Lyonet.

PAGE 112, 1. 15.

Cannot come from the animal. As we do not know, whether God has not beftowed fome degree of knowledge and reafon on brutes, and as the affirmative is at least probable, it feems wrong, fo pofitively to affert the contrary. But whether we fuppofe, that infects act from reafon, or that they are constrained to act as they do, by a blind inftinct, the glory of God is not the lefs confpicuous in either cafe. In the firit, we cannot but admire the wisdom of the Creator, who has made machines which, without reason, can act as confequentially as if they were endowed with it; in the other, we must admire the fame Wikdom, that could create fo many different forts of beings, of more limited knowledge than we are, but, neverthelefs, fufficiently intelligent to provide for their own prefervation, and that of their race.

In

the