Curious Facts in the History of Insects; Including Spiders and Scorpions Part 27

In the old English translation of the Bible, the observation of our Saviour to the Pharisees, "Ye blind guides, which strain _at_ a Gnat, and swallow a camel," is rendered "which strain _out_ a Gnat," and Bishop Pearce observes that this is conformable to the sense of the pa.s.sage. An allusion is made to the custom which prevailed in Oriental countries of pa.s.sing their wine and other liquors through a strainer, that no Gnats or flies might get into the cup. In the Fragments to Calmet, we are informed that there is a modern Arabic proverb to this effect, "He swallowed an elephant, but was strangled by a fly."[957]

Tipulidae--Crane-flies.

The larvae of a species of Agaric-Gnat (_Mycetophila_) live in society, and emigrate in files in a very soldier-like manner. First goes one, next follow two, then three, etc., so as to exhibit a singular serpentine appearance. The common people of Germany call this file _heerwurm_, and, it is said, view them with great dread, regarding them as ominous of war.[958]

Maupertuis, in describing his ascent to Mount Pulinga, in Lapland, says: "They had to fell a whole wood of large trees, and the Flies (most probably _Tipulidae_) attack'd 'em with that fury, that the very soldiers, tho' harden'd to the greatest fatigues, were obliged to rap up their faces, or cover them with tar. These insects poison'd their victuals, for no sooner was a dish serv'd, but it was quite covered with them."[959] Maupertuis, in another place, says: "These Flies make Lapland less tolerable in the summer than the cold does in the winter."[960] The severity with which the Tipulidae torment the Laplanders is attested also by Acerby,[961] Linnaeus,[962] De Geer,[963]

and Reaumur.[964]

Muscidae--Flies.

Among the instances recorded of Flies appearing in immense numbers, the following are the most remarkable:

"When the Creole frigate was lying in the outer roads of Buenos Ayres, in 1819, at a distance of six miles from the land, her decks and rigging were suddenly covered with thousands of Flies and grains of sand. The sides of the vessel had just received a fresh coat of paint, to which the insects adhered in such numbers as to spot and disfigure the vessel, and to render it necessary partially to renew the paint. Capt. W. H.

Smyth was obliged to repaint his vessel, the Adventure, in the Mediterranean, from the same cause. He was on his way from Malta to Tripoli, when a southern wind blowing from the coast of Africa, then one hundred miles distant, drove such myriads of Flies upon the fresh paint that not the smallest point was left unoccupied by the insects."[965]

"In May, 1699, at Kerton," records Mrs. Th.o.r.esby, p. 15, "in Lincolns.h.i.+re, the sky seemed to darken north-westward at a little distance from the town, as though it had been a shower of hailstones or snow; but when it came near the town, it appeared to be a prodigious swarm of Flies, which went with such a force toward the south-east that persons were forced to turn their backs of them."[966]

On the morning of the 17th of September, 1831, a small dipterous insect, belonging to Meigen's genus _Chlorops_, and nearly allied to, if not identical with, his _C. laeta_, appeared suddenly, and in such immense quant.i.ties, in one of the upper rooms of the Provost's Lodge, in King's College, Cambridge, that the greater part of the ceiling toward the window of the room was so thickly covered as not to be visible. They entered by a window looking due north, while the wind was blowing steadily N. N. W. So it appears they came from the direction of the River Cam, or rather came with its current.[967]

In the summer of 1834, which season was remarkable in England for its swarms and shoals of insects, the air was constantly filled, says a writer in The Mirror, with millions of small delicate Flies, and the sea in many places, particularly on the Norfolk coasts, was perfectly blackened by the amazing shoals. The length of these ma.s.ses was not determined; but they were, it is a.s.serted, at least a league broad. It is said the oldest fishermen of those seas never remembered having seen or heard of such a phenomenon.[968]

Capt. Dampier calls the natives of New Holland the "poor winking people of New Holland," and concludes his description of them with the following observations: "Their eyelids are always half closed, to keep the Flies out of their eyes, they being so troublesome here that no fanning will keep them from coming to one's face; and without the a.s.sistance of both hands to keep them off they will creep into one's nostrils, and mouth, too, if the lips are not shut very close. So that from their infancy, being thus annoyed with these insects, they do never open their eyes as other people, and therefore they cannot see far, unless they hold up their heads, as if they were looking at something over them."[969]

In a house at Zaffraan-craal, Dr. Sparrman suffered so much from the common House-fly, _Musca domestica_, which, in the south of Africa, frequently appears in such prodigious numbers as to cover almost entirely the walls and ceilings, that, as he a.s.serts, it was impossible for him to keep within doors for any length of time. To get rid of these troublesome pests, the natives resort to a very ingenious contrivance.

It is thus related by the above-mentioned traveler: "Bunches of herbs are hung up all over the ceiling, on which the Flies settle in great numbers; a person then takes a linen net or bag, of a considerable depth, fixed to a long handle, and, inclosing in it every bunch, shakes it about, so that the Flies fall down to the bottom of the bag: when, after several applications of it in this manner, they are killed by a pint or a quart at a time, by dipping the bag into scalding hot water."[970]

Rhasis, Avicen, and Albertus say: "Bury the tail of a wolf in the house, and the Flies will not come into it."[971]

Berytius says: "Flies will never rest on dumb animals if they are rubbed with the fat of a lion."[972]

Pliny says: "At Rome yee shall not have a Flie or dog that will enter into the chappell of Hercules standing in the beast market."[973]

Plutarch, in the Eighth Book of his Symposiaques, learnedly discourses upon the tamableness of the Fly. His opinion is that it cannot be tamed.[974]

Moufet, in his Theater of Insects, says: "Many ways doth nature also by Flies play with the fancies of men in dreams, if we may credit Apomasaris in his Apotelesms. For the Indians, Persians, and aegyptians do teach, that if Flies appear to us in our sleep, it doth signifie an herauld at arms, or an approaching disease. If a general of an army, or a chief commander, dream that at such or such a place he should see a great company of Flies, in that very place, wherever it shall be, there he shall be in anguish and grief for his soldiers that are slain, his army routed, and the victory lost. If a mean or ordinary man dream the like, he shall fall into a violent fever, which likely may cost him his life. If a man dream in his sleep that Flies went into his mouth or nostrils, he is to expect with great sorrow and grief imminent destruction from his enemies."[975]

In an English North country chap-book, ent.i.tled the Royal Dream-book, we find: "To dream of Flies or other vermin, denotes enemies of all sorts."[976]

"When we see," says Hollingshed, "a great number of Flies in a yeare, we naturallie iudge it like to be a great plague."[977]

Among the deep-sea fishermen of Greenock (Scotland), there is a most comical idea that if a Fly falls into a gla.s.s from which any one has been drinking, or is about to drink, it is considered a sure omen of good luck to the drinker, and is always noticed as such by the company.[978] Has this any connection with our saying of "taking a gla.s.s with a _fly_ in it?"

If Flies die in great numbers in a house, it is believed by the common people to be a sure sign of death to some one in the family occupying it; if throughout the country, an omen of general pestilence. It is positively a.s.serted that Flies always die before the breaking out of the cholera, and believed that they die of this disease.

Moufet, in his Theater of Insects, says: "When the Flies bite harder than ordinary, making at the face and eyes of men, they foretell rain or wet weather, from whence Politian hath it:

Thirsty for blood the Fly returns, And with his sting the skin he burns.

Perhaps before rain they are most hungry, and therefore, to a.s.swage their hunger, do more diligently seek after their food. This also is to be observed, that a little before a showre or a storme comes, the Flies descend from the upper region of the air to the lowest, and do fly, as it were, on the very surface of the earth. Moreover, if you see them very busie about sweet-meats or unguents, you may know that it will presently be a showre. But if they be in all places many and numerous, and shall so continue long (if Alexander Benedict and Johannes Damascenus say true), they foretell a plague or pestilence, because so many of them could not be bred of a little putrefaction of the air."[979] Elsewhere Moufet states: "Neither are Flies begotten of dung only, but of any other filthy matter putrefied by heat in the summer time, and after the same way spoken of before, as Grapaldus and Lonicerus have very well noted."[980]

Willsford, in his Nature's Secrets, p. 135, says: "Flies in the spring or summer season, if they grow busier or blinder than at other times, or that they are observed to shroud themselves in warm places, expect then quickly to follow either hail, cold storms of rain, or very much wet weather; and if these little creatures are noted early in autumn to repair into their winter quarters, it presages frosty mornings, cold storms, with the approach of h.o.a.ry winter. Atomes of Flies swarming together, and sporting themselves in the sunbeams, is a good omen of fair weather."[981]

In Gayton's Pleasant Notes upon Don Quixot, 1654, p. 99, speaking of Sancho Panza's having converted a ca.s.sock into a wallet, our pleasant annotator observes: "It was serviceable, after this greasie use, for nothing but to preach at a carnivale or Shrove Tuesday, and to tosse Pancakes in after the exercise; or else, if it could have been conveighed thither, nothing more proper for a man that preaches the Cook's sermon at Oxford, when that plump society rides upon their governour's horses to fetch in the Enemie, the Flie." That there was such a custom at Oxford, let Peshall, in his history of that city, be a voucher, who, speaking of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, p. 280, says: "To this Hospital cooks from Oxford flocked, bringing in on Whitsun-week the Fly." Aubrey saw this ceremony performed in 1642. He adds: "On Michaelmas-day, they rode thither again to carry the Fly away."[982]

Plutarch, in his disquisition on the Art of Discerning a Flatterer from a Friend, makes the following curious comparison: "The Gad-Flie (as they say) which useth to plague bulles and oxen, setteth about their eares, and so doth the tick deal by dogges: after the same manner, flatterers take hold of ambitious mens eares, and possesse them with praises; and being once set fast there, hardly are they to be removed and chased away."[983]

Plautus twice compares envious and inquisitive persons to Flies.[984]

In a narrative of unheard-of Popish cruelties toward Protestants beyond Seas, printed in 1680, we find the insinuating detectives of the Spanish Inquisition under the name of Flies.[985]

Flies are mentioned somewhere in Lyndwood as the emblem of unclean thoughts.[986]

Flies were driven away when a woman was in labor, for fear she should bring forth a daughter.[987]

Flies are found represented in the pottery of the ancient Egyptians.[988]

Flies (_Cuspi_) were sacrificed to the Sun by the ancient Peruvians.[989]

"To let a Flee (Fly) stick i' the wa'" is, in Scotland, not to speak on some particular topic, to pa.s.s it over without remark.[990]

"Certes, a strange thing it is of these Flies," says Pliny, "which are taken to be as senselesse and witlesse creatures, yea, and of as little capacity and understanding as any other whatsoever: and yet at the solemne games and plaies holden every fifth yeare at Olympia, no sooner is the bull sacrificed there to the Idoll or G.o.d of the Flies called Myiodes, but a man shall see (a wonderful thing to tell) infinit thousand of flies depart out of that territorie by flights, as it were thick clouds."[991]

This Myiodes or Maagrus, the "Fly-catcher," was the name of a hero, invoked at Aliphera, at the festivals of Athena, as the protector against Flies. It was also a surname of Hercules.

The following rendering of the second verse of the first chapter of the Second Book of Kings, by Josephus, contains an allusion to the wors.h.i.+p of Baalzebub under the form of a Fly: "Now it happened that _Ahaziah_, as he was coming down from the top of his house, fell down from it, and in his sickness sent to the _Fly_ (Baalzebub), which was the G.o.d of _Ekron_, for that was this G.o.d's name, to enquire about his recovery."[992]

With reference to this wors.h.i.+p, we read in Purchas's Pilgrims: "At Accaron was wors.h.i.+pped _Baalzebub_, that is, the Lord of the Flies, either of contempt of his idolatrie, so called; or rather of the mult.i.tude of Flies, which attended the mult.i.tude of his sacrifices, when from the sacrifices at the Temple of Jerusalem, as some say, they were wholly free: or for that hee was their Larder-G.o.d (as the Roman _Hercules_) to drive away flies: or for that from a forme of a Flie, in which he was wors.h.i.+pped.... But for Beelzebub, he was their _aesculapius_ or Physicke G.o.d, as appeareth by Ahaziah who sent to consult with him in his sickness. And perhaps from this cause the blaspheming Pharisies, rather applyed the name of this then any other Idoll to our blessed Saviour (Math. x. 25) whom they saw indeed to performe miraculous cures, which superst.i.tion had conceived of _Baalzebub_: and if any thing were done by that Idoll, it could by no other cause bee effected but by the Devill, as tending (like the popish miracles) to the confirmation of Idolatrie."[993]

This G.o.d of the Flies was so called, thinks Whiston, as was Jove among the Greeks, from his supposed power over Flies, in driving them away from the flesh of their sacrifices, which otherwise would have been very troublesome to them.[994]

It has been conjectured that the Fly, under which Baalzebub was represented, was the Tumble-bug, _Scarabaeus pilluarius_; in which case, says Dr. Smith, Baalzebub and Beelzebub might be used indifferently.[995]

"Urspergensis saith that the Devil did very frequently appear in the form of a Fly; whence it was that some of the heathens called their familiar spirit _Musca_ or Fly: perchance alluding to that of Plautus:

Hic pol musca est, mi pater, Sive profanum, sive public.u.m, nil clam illum haberi potest: Quin adsit ibi illico, et rem omnem tenet.--

This man, O my father, is a Fly, nothing can be concealed from him, be it secret or publick, he is presently there, and knowes all the matter."[996]

Loke, the deceiver of the G.o.ds, is fabled in the Northern Mythology, to have metamorphosed himself into a Fly: and demons, in the shape of Flies, were kept imprisoned by the Finlanders, to be let loose on men and beasts.[997]

In Scotland, a tutelary Fly, believed immortal, presided over a fountain in the county of Banff: and here also a large blue Fly, resting on the bark of trees, was distinguished as a witch.[998]

Among the games and plays of the ancient Greeks was the ?a??? ???a, or Brazen Fly:--a variety of blind-man's-buff, in which a boy having his eyes bound with a fillet, went groping round, calling out, "I am seeking the Brazen Fly." His companions replied, "You may seek, but you will not find it"--at the same time striking him with cords made of the inner bark of the papyros; and thus they proceeded till one of them was taken.[999]

This is most probably an allusion to some species of Fly of a bronze color which is most difficult to catch, as, for instance, the little fly found in summer beneath arbors, apparently standing motionless in the air.

Petrus Ramus tells us of an iron Fly, made by Regiomonta.n.u.s, a famous mathematician of Nuremberg, which, at a feast, to which he had invited his familiar friends, flew forth from his hand, and taking a round, returned to his hand again, to the great astonishment of the beholders.