The Book Of Curiosities Part 30

See all but man with unearn'd pleasure gay See her bright robes the b.u.t.terfly unfold, Broke from her wintry tomb in prime of May!

What youthful bride can equal her array?

Who can with her for easy pleasure vie?

From mead to mead with gentle wing to stray, From flower to flower on balmy gales to fly, Is all she has to do beneath the radiant sky.

_Thomson._

The first thing which fixes our attention on beholding these aerial inhabitants, is, the clothing with which they are adorned. Yet some of them have nothing in this respect to engage our notice, their vestment is simple and uniform; others have a few ornaments on the wings; but with some, those ornaments amount to profusion, and they are covered with them all over. This last species will occupy us for a short interval. How beautiful are the gradations of colour which decorate them! what harmony in those spots which relieve the other parts of their attire! with what delicacy has nature pencilled them! But, whatever may be my admiration when I consider this insect by the naked eye, how greatly is it augmented, when I behold this beautiful object through the medium of the microscope!

Would any one ever have imagined, that the wings of b.u.t.terflies were furnished with feathers? Nothing, however, is more true; and what we commonly call dust, is found in reality to be feathers. Their structure and arrangement are adjusted to as perfect symmetry, as their colours are soft and brilliant. The parts which form the centre of these little feathers, and which immediately touch the wing, are the strongest; those, on the contrary, which compose the exterior circ.u.mference, are much more delicate, and of an extraordinary fineness. All these feathers have a quill at their base, but the superior part is more transparent than the quill from which it proceeds. If we lay hold of the wing too rudely, we destroy the most delicate part of the feathers; but if we remove all that we term dust, there remains only a thin transparent skin, where may be distinguished the little orifices in which the quill of each feather was lodged. This skin, from the nature of its texture, may be as easily discerned from the rest of the wing, as a fine gauze from the cloth on which it is fastened; it is more porous, more delicate, and seems as if embroidered by the needle; to complete its beauty, its extremity finishes by a fringe, whose minute threads succeed each other with the utmost regularity.

What are our most laboured dresses, what is all their boasted ornament, in comparison of that refined tissue with which nature has invested this simple insect? Our finest laces are only like coa.r.s.e cloth, when brought to vie with that luxurious clothing which covers the wings of the b.u.t.terfly; and our smallest thread, by their infinitely delicate fibres, swells into hempen cord. Such is the wonderful difference to be observed between the works of nature and those of art, when viewed through a microscope. The former are finished to all imaginable perfection; the others, even the most beautiful of their kind, appear incomplete and coa.r.s.ely wrought. How fine a piece of delicate cambric appears to us!

nothing more slender than the threads, nothing more uniform than the texture: and yet in the microscope these threads resemble hempen strings, and we should rather be tempted to believe that they had been interlaced by the hand of a basket-maker, than wrought on the loom of a skilful weaver.

What is most astonishing in this brilliant insect, is, that it proceeds from a worm, than which nothing has a more abject and vile appearance.

Behold how the b.u.t.terfly displays to the sun his splendid wings, how he sports in his rays, how he rejoices in his existence, and, in respiring the vernal airs, how he flutters in the meadow from flower to flower. His rich wings present to us the magnificence of the rainbow. How beautiful is he now, who but a little while ago crept a worm in the dust, in perpetual danger of being crushed to death! Who has raised him above the earth? Who has given to him the faculty of inhabiting the ethereal regions? Who has furnished him with his painted wings? It is G.o.d.

In down of ev'ry variegated dye, Shines, flutt'ring soft, the gaudy b.u.t.terfly; That powder, which thy spoiling hand distains, The form of quills and painted plumes contains: Not courts can more magnificence express, In all their blaze of gems and pomp of dress.

_Browne._

Their wings, all glorious to behold, Bedropt with azure, jet, and gold, Wide they display; the spangled dew Reflects their eyes and various hue.

_Gay._

We shall now briefly describe THE METAMORPHOSES OF INSECTS. And first, THE b.u.t.tERFLY:

From form to form they pa.s.s in wondrous change.

_Virgil._

At the first exclusion from the egg, and for some months of its existence afterwards, the creature which is to become a b.u.t.terfly, is a worm-like caterpillar, crawling upon sixteen short legs, greedily devouring leaves with two jaws, and seeing by means of twelve eyes, so minute, as to be nearly imperceptible without the aid of a microscope. We now view it furnished with wings capable of rapid and extensive flights; of its sixteen feet, ten have disappeared, and the remaining six are in most respects wholly unlike those to which they have succeeded; its jaws having vanished, are replaced by a curled-up proboscis, suited only for sipping liquid sweets; the form of its head is entirely changed, two long horns projecting from its upper surface; and, instead of twelve invisible eyes, you behold two, very large, and composed of at least twenty thousand convex lenses, each supposed to be a distinct and effective eye!

Were we to push our examination further, and, by dissection, to compare the internal conformation of the caterpillar with that of the b.u.t.terfly, we should witness changes even more extraordinary. In the former we should find some thousands of muscles, which in the latter are replaced by others, of a form and structure entirely different. Nearly the whole body of the caterpillar is occupied by a capacious stomach. In the b.u.t.terfly, this has become converted into an almost imperceptible thread-like viscus; and the abdomen is now filled by two large packets of eggs, or other organs, not visible in the first state. In the former, two spirally-convoluted tubes were filled with a silky gum; in the latter, both tubes and silk have almost totally vanished, and changes equally great have taken place in the economy and structure of the nerves and other organs.

What a surprising transformation! Nor was this all. The change from one form to the other was not direct; an intermediate state, not less singular, intervened. After casting its skin, even to its very jaws, several times, and attaining its full growth, the caterpillar attached itself to a leaf by a silken girth. Its body became greatly contracted; its skin once more split asunder, and disclosed an oviform ma.s.s, without exterior mouth, eyes, or limbs, and exhibiting no other symptom of life than a slight motion when touched. In this state of death-like torpor, and without tasting food, the insect existed for several months, until at length the tomb burst, and out of a case not more than an inch long, and a quarter of an inch in diameter, proceeded the b.u.t.terfly, which covers a surface of nearly four inches square.

THE COMMON FLY.--This winged insect, whose delicate palate selects out the choicest viands, one while extending his proboscis to the margin of a drop of wine, and then gaily flying to take a more solid repast from a pear or a peach; now gambolling with his comrades in the air, now gracefully carrying his furled wings with his taper feet;--was but the other day a disgusting grub, without wings, without legs, without eyes, wallowing, well pleased, in the midst of a ma.s.s of excrement.

THE GREYCOATED GNAT.--This creature, whose humming salutation, while she makes her airy circles about our bed, gives terrific warning of the sanguinary operation in which she is ready to engage, was a few hours ago the inhabitant of a stagnant pool, more in shape like a fish than an insect. Then to have been taken out of the water would have been speedily fatal; now it could as little exist in any other element than air. Then it breathed through its tail; now through openings in its sides. Its shapeless head, in that period of its existence, is now exchanged for one adorned with elegantly tufted antennae, and furnished, instead of jaws, with an apparatus more artfully constructed than the cupping-gla.s.ses of the phlebotomist; an apparatus, which, at the same time that it strikes in the lancets, composes a tube for pumping up the flowing blood.

THE SHARDHORN BEETLE.--This species of beetle, whose sullen hum, as he directs his droning flight close past our ears in our evening walk, was not in his infancy an inhabitant of air, the first period of his life being spent in gloomy solitude, as a grub, under the surface of the earth.

The shapeless maggot, which we scarcely fail to meet with in some one of every handful of nuts we crack, would not always have grovelled in that humble state. If our unlucky intrusion upon its vaulted dwelling had not left it to perish in the wide world, it would have continued to reside there until its full growth had been attained. Then it would have gnawed itself an opening, and, having entered the earth, and pa.s.sed a few months in a state of inaction, would at length have emerged an elegant beetle, furnished with a slender and very long ebony beak; two wings, and two wing-cases, ornamented with yellow bands; six feet; and in every respect unlike the worm from which it proceeded.

THE DEATH-WATCH.--This appalling name is applied to a harmless, diminutive insect, because it emits a sound resembling the ticking of a watch, and is supposed to predict the death of some one of the family, in the house in which it is heard. Thus sings the muse of the witty Dean of St. Patrick on this subject:--

"------------------------------A wood worm That lies in old wood, like a hare in her form: With teeth or with claws, it will bite or will scratch, And chambermaids christen this worm a death-watch; Because like a watch it always cries click: Then woe be to those in the house who are sick!

For, sure as a gun, they will give up the ghost, If the maggot cries click, when it scratches the post: But a kettle of scalding-hot water injected Infallibly cures the timber affected; The omen is broken, the danger is over, The maggot will die, and the sick will recover."

To add to the effect of this noise, it is said to be made only when there is a profound silence in an apartment, and every one is still.

Authors were formerly not agreed concerning the insect from which this sound of terror proceeded, some attributing it to a kind of woodlouse, and others to a spider; but it is now a received opinion, adopted upon satisfactory evidence, that it is produced by some little beetles belonging to the timber-boring genus, _An.o.bium, F._ Swammerdam observes, that a small beetle, which he had in his collection, having firmly fixed its fore-legs, and put its inflexed head between them, makes a continual noise in old pieces of wood, walls, and ceilings, which is sometimes so loud, that upon hearing it, people have fancied that hobgoblins, ghosts, or fairies, were wandering around them. Evidently this was one of the death-watches. Latreille observed _An.o.bium striatum, F._ produce the sound in question, by a stroke of its mandibles upon the wood, which was answered by a similar noise from within it. But the species whose proceedings have been most noticed by British observers, is, _A.

tessellatum, F._ When spring is far advanced, these insects are said to commence their ticking, which is only a call to each other, to which, if no answer be returned, the animal repeats it in another place. It is thus produced: Raising itself upon its hind-legs, with the body somewhat inclined, it beats its head with great force and agility upon the plane of its position; and its strokes are so powerful, as to make a considerable impression if they fall upon any substance softer than wood. The general number of distinct strokes in succession, is from seven to nine or eleven; they follow each other quickly, and are repeated at uncertain intervals.

In old houses, where these insects abound, they may be heard in warm weather during the whole day. The noise exactly resembles that produced by tapping moderately with the nail upon a table; and, when familiarized, the insect will answer very readily the tap of the nail.

CHAP. x.x.xI.

CURIOSITIES RESPECTING INSECTS.--(_Continued._)

_Locusts and Mosquitoes, and their Uses in the Creation;--from Kirby, Spence, and Fothergill._

LOCUSTS.--If we could discover the use of every animal in the creation, we should gain a very clear insight into the grand designs of the Almighty, respecting creatures inferior to ourselves, and perceive the immediate cause and necessity of their existence, and how far we have a right to interfere with their economy. That man should ever attain the whole extent of this knowledge, in this state of existence, can scarcely be hoped for; but, that he may learn much, there can be no doubt.

Because the utility of some animals, in a general view, is not palpably obvious, we ought not pettishly or hopelessly to give up the inquiry. Some of the most numerous are apparently the most noxious, and the least useful, as the locust (_gryllus migratorius_) for example. It has never been my fortune to visit countries subject to the devastations of these insects; and the travellers who describe them, seem, either through want of inclination, or astonishment at the desolating effects produced by their incursions, unable to give those facts which an industrious and attentive naturalist, with enlarged views, might collect and apply to some useful purpose; for there can be no doubt that Infinite Wisdom would not have permitted these insects to be so numerous as they are, if their existence was not absolutely necessary. To look at a locust in a cabinet of insects, we should not, at first sight, deem it capable of being the source of so much evil to mankind as stands on record against it. Yet, although this animal be not very tremendous for its size, nor very terrific in its appearance, it is the very same whose ravages have been the theme of naturalists and historians in all ages, and, upon a close examination, it will be found to be peculiarly fitted and furnished for the execution of its office.

It is armed with two pair of very strong jaws, the upper terminating in short, and the lower in long teeth, by which it can both lacerate and grind its food; its stomach is of extraordinary capacity and powers; its hind-legs enable it to leap to a considerable distance, and its ample vans are calculated to catch the wind as sails, and so carry it sometimes over the sea; and although a single individual can effect but little evil, yet, when the entire surface of a country is covered by them, and every one makes bare the spot on which it stands, the mischief produced may be as extensive as their numbers. So well do the Arabians know their power, that they make a locust say to Mahomet, "We are the army of the Great G.o.d; we produce ninety-nine eggs: if the hundred were completed, we should consume the whole earth, and all that is in it."--_Bochart._

The earliest plague produced by the locusts, which has been recorded, appears also to have been the most direful in its immediate effects, that ever was inflicted upon any nation. It is that with which the Egyptian tyrant and his people were visited for their oppression of the Israelites.

Only conceive of a country so covered by them, that no one can see the face of the ground--a whole land darkened, and all its produce, whether herb or trees, so devoured, that not the least vestige of green is left in either.--_Exod._ x. 5, 14, 15. But it is not necessary to enlarge upon a history, the circ.u.mstances of which are so well known. To this species of devastation, Africa in general seems always to have been peculiarly subject. This may be gathered from the law in Cyrenaica mentioned by Pliny, by which the inhabitants were enjoined to destroy the locusts in three different states, three times in the year; first their eggs, then their young, and lastly the perfect insect.[17] And not without reason was such a law enacted; for Orosius tells us, that in the year of the world 3,800, Africa was infested by such infinite myriads of these animals, that, having devoured every green thing, after flying off to sea they were drowned, and, being cast upon the sh.o.r.e, they emitted a stench greater than could have been produced by the carcases of 100,000 men!--_Oros.

contra Pag._ l. v. c. 2. St. Augustine also mentions a plague to have arisen in that country from the same cause, which destroyed no less than 800,000 persons (_octoginta hominum millia_) in the kingdom of Masanissa alone, and many more in the territories bordering upon the sea.--_Less._ l. 247. note 46. From Africa this plague was occasionally imported into Italy and Spain; and an historian quoted in Mouffet relates, that in the year 591 an infinite army of locusts, of a size unusually large, grievously ravaged part of Italy; and being at last cast into the sea, from their stench arose a pestilence which carried off near a million of men and beasts. In the Venetian territory also, in the year 1478, more than 30,000 persons are said to have perished in a famine occasioned by these terrific scourges. Many other instances of their devastations in Europe, in France, Spain, Italy, Germany, and other countries, are recorded by the same author. In 1650 a cloud of them was seen to enter Russia in three different places, which from thence pa.s.sed over into Poland and Lithuania, where the air was darkened by their numbers. In some places they were seen lying dead, heaped one upon another to the depth of four feet; in others they covered the surface like a black cloth; the trees bent with their weight; and the damage they did exceeded all computation.--_Bingley_, iii. 258. At a later period, in Languedoc, when the sun became hot, they took wing, and fell upon the corn, devouring both leaf and ear, and that with such expedition, that in three hours they would consume a whole field. After having eaten up the corn, they attacked the vines, the pulse, the willows, and lastly, the hemp, notwithstanding its bitterness.--_Philos. Trans._ 1686. Sir H. Davy informs us (_Elements of Agricultural Chemistry_, 233.) that the French government in 1813 issued a decree with a view to occasion the destruction of gra.s.shoppers.

Even this happy island, so remarkably distinguished by its exemption from most of those scourges to which other nations are exposed, was once alarmed by the appearance of locusts. In 1748 they were observed here in considerable numbers, but providentially they soon perished without propagating. These were evidently stragglers from the vast swarms which in the preceding year did such infinite damage in Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, Hungary, and Poland. One of these swarms, which entered Transylvania in August, was several hundred fathoms in width, (at Vienna the breadth of one of them was three miles,) and extended to so great a length, as to be four hours in pa.s.sing over the Red Tower; and such was its density, that it totally intercepted the solar light, so that when they flew low, one person could not see another at the distance of twenty paces.--_Philos. Trans._ xlvi. 30. A similar account has been given by Major Moor, long resident in India. He relates, that when at Poonah, he was witness to an immense army of locusts which ravaged the Mahratta country, and was supposed to come from Arabia: this, if correct, is a strong proof of their power to pa.s.s the sea under favourable circ.u.mstances. The column they composed, extended five hundred miles; and so compact was it, when on the wing, that, like an eclipse, it completely hid the sun, so that no shadow was cast by any object; and some lofty tombs, distant from his residence not more than two hundred yards, were rendered quite invisible. This was not the _Gryllus migratorius, L._ but a red species; which circ.u.mstance much increased the horror of the scene, for, cl.u.s.tering upon the trees after they had stripped them of their foliage, they imparted to them a sanguine hue. The peach was the last tree they touched.

Dr. Clarke, to give some idea of the infinite numbers of these animals, compares them to a flight of snow when the flakes are carried obliquely by the wind. They covered his carriage and horses; and the Tartars a.s.sert, that people are sometimes suffocated by them. The whole face of nature might have been described as covered by a living veil. They consisted of two species, _G. tartaricus_, and _migratorius, L._; the first is almost twice the size of the second, and, because it precedes it, is called by the Tartars, the herald or messenger.--_Travels_, i. 348. The account of another traveller, Mr. Barrow, of their ravages in the southern parts of Africa, in 1784, and 1797, is still more striking: an area of nearly two thousand square miles might be said literally to be covered by them. When driven into the sea by a N. W. wind, they formed upon the sh.o.r.e, for fifty miles, a bank three or four feet high; and when the wind was S. E. the stench was so powerful, as to be smelt at the distance of a hundred and fifty miles.--_Travels_, &c. 257.

From 1778 to 1780, the empire of Morocco was terribly devastated by them; every green thing was eaten up, not even the bitter bark of the orange and pomegranate escaping. A most dreadful famine ensued: the poor were seen to wander over the country, deriving a miserable subsistence from the roots of plants; and women and children followed the camels, from whose dung they picked the undigested grains of barley, which they devoured with avidity: in consequence of this, vast numbers perished, and the roads and streets exhibited the unburied carcases of the dead. On this sad occasion, fathers sold their children, and husbands their wives.--_Southey's Thalaba_, i. 171.

When they visit a country, (says Mr. Jackson, speaking of the same empire,) it behoves every one to lay in provision for a famine, for they stay from three to seven years. When they have devoured all other vegetables, they attack the trees, consuming first the leaves and then the bark. From Mogadar to Tangier, before the plague in 1799, the face of the earth was covered by them: at that time a singular incident occurred at El Arisch. The whole region from the confines of Sahara was ravaged by them; but on the other side of the river El Kos, not one of them was to be seen, though there was nothing to prevent their flying over it. Till then, they had proceeded northward; but, upon arriving at its banks, they turned to the east, though all the country north of Arisch was full of pulse, fruits, and grain, exhibiting a most striking contrast to the desolation of the adjoining district. At length they were all carried by a violent hurricane into the western ocean; the sh.o.r.e, as in former instances, was covered by their carcases, and a pestilence was caused by the horrid stench which they emitted: but when this evil ceased, their devastations were followed by a most abundant crop. The Arabs of the desert, "whose hands are against every man," _Gen._ xvi. 12. and who rejoice in the evil that befalls other nations, when they behold the clouds of locusts proceeding from the north, are filled with gladness, antic.i.p.ating a general mortality, which they call _el khere_, (the benediction;) for, when a country is thus laid waste, they emerge from their arid deserts, and pitch their tents in the desolated plains.--_Jackson's Travels in Morocco_, 54.

The noise the locusts make when engaged in the work of destruction, has been compared to the sound of a flame of fire driven by the wind, and the effect of their bite to that of fire.--_Bochart._ A poet of our own day has very strikingly described the noise produced by their flight and approach:--

Onward they came, a dark continuous cloud Of congregated myriads, numberless, The rushing of whose wings was as the sound Of a broad river, headlong in its course Plung'd from a mountain summit, or the roar Of a wild ocean in the autumn storm, Shattering its billows on a sh.o.r.e of rocks!

_Southey's Thalaba_, i. 169.

But no account of the appearance and ravages of these terrific insects, for correctness and sublimity, comes near to that of the prophet Joel: "A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations. A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as hors.e.m.e.n, so shall they run. Like the noise of chariots[18] on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle-array. Before their face the people shall be much pained; all faces shall gather blackness. They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks: neither shall one thrust another; they shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded. They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief. The earth shall quake before them, the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining!" The usual way in which they are destroyed, is also noticed by the prophet. "I will remove far off from you the northern army, and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, because he hath done great things!"--_Joel_ ii. 2-10, 20.

The best method of destroying locusts, would be to recommend them as an article of food. In the Crimea, they are often eaten by the inhabitants.

Some French emigrants, who had been directed in this manner, a.s.sured me, that when fried, they were very palatable and very wholesome. The Arabs, according to Ha.s.selquist, eat them roasted, and are glad to get them.

It is quite certain that there is nothing endued by nature with peculiar functions, in vain; and it is equally certain, that matter, however modified, whether in the form of animated or inanimated bodies, is continually undergoing change. The more deeply we investigate the works of creation, the more strong will be our conviction of these truths.

We know that many animals, and particularly insects, have apparently no other employment, than that of clearing or purifying the surface of the earth of superfluous matter, the residuum of decayed bodies, or of reconverting it into useful forms, as I shall attempt to ill.u.s.trate hereafter. Now, if we survey those regions which give birth to, and support, the vast clouds of locusts alluded to, our view will be confined princ.i.p.ally to the extensive deserts of Africa and Asia; the vegetation of many of which, according to the reports of travellers, is abundant and luxuriant, beyond the conception of those who have not beheld them; insomuch, that the crops of gra.s.s, and other annual vegetables, absolutely load the earth; and these, perishing upon each other, would form an impenetrable, putrid ma.s.s, if not consumed by some animals appointed for the purpose.

That locusts support existence by vegetable food, is well known; but whether they have no other object than to consume the superabundant produce of the regions they frequent, and to procreate, is not so easily proved. One who has had no opportunity of witnessing their manners, from their birth to their final destruction, can scarcely be able positively to decide; but I have no doubt that an intelligent naturalist, (governed by the principles this chapter is intended, in some measure, to ill.u.s.trate,) with the necessary opportunities, such as Dr. Shaw, in particular, had, would be able to get at facts that would indisputably prove the existence of locusts to be a blessing rather than a curse.

Whatever may be the direct object of their existence, locusts are of great use to many other animals, for there are some, particularly birds, that entirely prey upon them; and, if man himself refuses this food, it is rather from the prejudice, perhaps, of an absurd education, than from any improper or bad quality of the food itself.[19] The inhabitants of several eastern nations have a relish for this diet: and it is recorded of him who cried in the wilderness, "Prepare ye the way of the Lord," that "his meat was locusts and wild honey."--_Matthew_ iii. 4. After this, we cannot listen to the feeble remonstrances of any modern epicure.