DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.68888#0287
Micrograph ia.
Eggs must certainly be very sinal!, which so sinal! a creature as a Gnat
yields, and therefore, we need not wonder that we find not the Eggs
themselves, some of the younger of them, which I have observ’d, having
not exceeded a tenth part of the bulk they have afterwards come to 5 and
next,! have obferved some osthose little ones which must have been gene-
rated after the Water was incloled in the Bottle, and therefore most pro-
bably from Eggs, whereas thole creatures have been suppos’d to be bred
of the corruption of the Water, there being not formerly known any
probable way how they Ihould be generated.
A stcond is, whether these Eggs are immediately dropt into the Water
by the Gnats themselves, or, mediately, are brought down by the falling
rain, for it seems not very improbable,but that those small seeds of GnaS
may (being, perhaps, of so light a nature, and having so great a propor-
tion of surface to so small a bulk of body) be ejested into the Air, and
so, perhaps, carried for a good while too and fro in it, till by the drops
of Rain it be walk’d out of it.
. A third is, whether multitudes os those other little creatures that are
found to inhabit the Water for some time, do not, at certain times, take
wing and fly into the Air, others dive and hide themselves in the Earth,
and so contribute to the increase both of the one and the other Element.
Poftfcrtyt* .
A good while since the writing of this Description, I was prestnted by
Doctor Peter Rall^ an ingenious Member of the Royal Society,with a little
Paper of Nuts, which he told me was lent him from a Brother of his out
of the Countrey,from Mamhead in Devonjhire^ some of them were loofe,
having been, as I supposo, broken osf, others were still growing fast on
upon the sides of a stick, which se’em’d by the bark, pliablenels of it, and
by certain sirings that grew out of it, to be some piece of the root of
a Tree 5 they were all of them dry’d, and a little Ihrivelsd, others more
round, of a brown colour 5 their shape was much like a Figg, but very
much smaIler,some being about the bignels of a Bay-berry .others,and the
biggest, of a Hazel-Nut. Some of these that had no hole in them, I care-
fully opened with my Knife, and found in them a good large round white
Maggot, almost as bigg as a small Pea, which Teem’d lhap’d like other
Maggots, but (hotter. I could not find them to move, though I ghels’d
them to be alive, becauso upon pricking them witha Pinn, there would is
soe out a great deal of white mucows matter,which seem’d to be from a vo-
luntary contraction of their Ikin 5 their hulk or matrix consided of three
Coats,like the barks of Trees, the outermost being more rough and ipon-
gie, and the thickest, the middlemost more dole, hard, white, and thin,
the innermost very thin,seeming almost like the (kin within an Egg’s lhell.
The two outermost had root in the branch or stick, but the innermost
had no stem or procels, but was onely a Ikin that cover’d the cavity of
the Nut. All the Nuts that had no holes eaten in them, I found to con-
tain thest Maggots, but all that had holes, I found empty, the Maggots,
Eggs must certainly be very sinal!, which so sinal! a creature as a Gnat
yields, and therefore, we need not wonder that we find not the Eggs
themselves, some of the younger of them, which I have observ’d, having
not exceeded a tenth part of the bulk they have afterwards come to 5 and
next,! have obferved some osthose little ones which must have been gene-
rated after the Water was incloled in the Bottle, and therefore most pro-
bably from Eggs, whereas thole creatures have been suppos’d to be bred
of the corruption of the Water, there being not formerly known any
probable way how they Ihould be generated.
A stcond is, whether these Eggs are immediately dropt into the Water
by the Gnats themselves, or, mediately, are brought down by the falling
rain, for it seems not very improbable,but that those small seeds of GnaS
may (being, perhaps, of so light a nature, and having so great a propor-
tion of surface to so small a bulk of body) be ejested into the Air, and
so, perhaps, carried for a good while too and fro in it, till by the drops
of Rain it be walk’d out of it.
. A third is, whether multitudes os those other little creatures that are
found to inhabit the Water for some time, do not, at certain times, take
wing and fly into the Air, others dive and hide themselves in the Earth,
and so contribute to the increase both of the one and the other Element.
Poftfcrtyt* .
A good while since the writing of this Description, I was prestnted by
Doctor Peter Rall^ an ingenious Member of the Royal Society,with a little
Paper of Nuts, which he told me was lent him from a Brother of his out
of the Countrey,from Mamhead in Devonjhire^ some of them were loofe,
having been, as I supposo, broken osf, others were still growing fast on
upon the sides of a stick, which se’em’d by the bark, pliablenels of it, and
by certain sirings that grew out of it, to be some piece of the root of
a Tree 5 they were all of them dry’d, and a little Ihrivelsd, others more
round, of a brown colour 5 their shape was much like a Figg, but very
much smaIler,some being about the bignels of a Bay-berry .others,and the
biggest, of a Hazel-Nut. Some of these that had no hole in them, I care-
fully opened with my Knife, and found in them a good large round white
Maggot, almost as bigg as a small Pea, which Teem’d lhap’d like other
Maggots, but (hotter. I could not find them to move, though I ghels’d
them to be alive, becauso upon pricking them witha Pinn, there would is
soe out a great deal of white mucows matter,which seem’d to be from a vo-
luntary contraction of their Ikin 5 their hulk or matrix consided of three
Coats,like the barks of Trees, the outermost being more rough and ipon-
gie, and the thickest, the middlemost more dole, hard, white, and thin,
the innermost very thin,seeming almost like the (kin within an Egg’s lhell.
The two outermost had root in the branch or stick, but the innermost
had no stem or procels, but was onely a Ikin that cover’d the cavity of
the Nut. All the Nuts that had no holes eaten in them, I found to con-
tain thest Maggots, but all that had holes, I found empty, the Maggots,