_The Family Library, No. 7. Library of Entertaining Knowledge, Part
6.--Insect Architecture_.
At present we can only notice these works as two of the most delightful
volumes that have for some time fallen into our hands, and as possessing
all the merits which characterize the previous portions of the Series.
Our cognizance of them, in a collected form, must rest till the other
half appears; in the meantime a few _flying_ extracts will prove
amusing:--
_Bees without a Queen_.
These humble creatures cherish their queen, feed her, and provide for
her wants. They live only in her life, and die when she is taken away.
Her absence deprives them of no organ, paralyzes no limb, yet in every
case they neglect all their duties for twenty-four hours. They receive
no stranger queen before the expiration of that time; and if deprived of
the cherished object altogether, they refuse food, and quickly perish.
What, it may be asked, is the physical cause of such devotion? What are
the bonds that chain the little creature to its cell, and force it to
prefer death, to the flowers and the sunshine that invite it to come
forth and live? This is not a solitary instance, in which the Almighty
has made virtues, apparently almost unattainable by us, natural to
animals! For while man has marked, with that praise which great and rare
good actions merit, those few instances in which one human being has
given up his own life for another--the dog, who daily sacrifices himself
for his master, has scarcely found an historian to record his common
virtue.--_Family Library_.
_Cleanliness of Bees_.
Among other virtues possessed by bees, cleanliness is one of the most
marked; they will not suffer the least filth in their abode. It
sometimes happens that an ill-advised slug or ignorant snail chooses to
enter the hive, and has even the audacity to walk over the comb; the
presumptuous and foul intruder is quickly killed, but its gigantic
carcass is not so speedily removed. Unable to transport the corpse
out of their dwelling, and fearing "the noxious smells" arising from
corruption, the bees adopt an efficacious mode of protecting themselves;
they embalm their offensive enemy, by covering him over with propolis;
both Maraldi and Reaumur have seen this. The latter observed that a
snail had entered a hive, and fixed itself to the glass side, just as
it does against walls, until the rain shall invite it to thrust out its
head beyond its shell. The bees, it seemed, did not like the interloper,
and not being able to penetrate the shell with their sting, took a
hint from the snail itself, and instead of covering it all over with
propolis, the cunning economists fixed it immovably, by cementing merely
the edge of the orifice of the shell to the glass with this resin, and
thus it became a prisoner for life, for rain cannot dissolve this
cement, as it does that which the insect itself uses.[5]--_Ibid_.
[5] For a notice of the application of this cement to useful
purposes, see No. 396, page 283.--ED. MIRROR.
It furnishes a subject of serious consideration, as well as an argument
for a special providence, to know, that the accurate Reaumur, and other
naturalists, have observed, that when any kind of insect has increased
inordinately, their natural enemies have increased in the same
proportion, and thus preserved the balance.--_Ibid_.
_Gnats_.
There are few insects with whose form we are better acquainted than
that of the gnat. It is to be found in all latitudes and climates; as
prolific in the Polar as in the Equatorial regions. In 1736 they were so
numerous, and were seen to rise in such clouds from Salisbury cathedral,
that they looked like columns of smoke, and frightened the people, who
thought the building was on fire. In 1766, they appeared at Oxford, in
the form of a thick black cloud; six columns were observed to ascend the
height of fifty or sixty feet. Their bite was attended with alarming
inflammation. To some appearances of this kind our great poet, Spenser,
alludes, in the following beautiful simile:--
As when a swarm of gnats at eventide,
Out of the fennes of Allan doe arise,
Their murmurring small trumpets sownden wide,
Whiles in the air their clust'ring army flies.
That as a cloud doth seem to dim the skies:
Ne man nor beast may rest or take repast,
For their sharp wounds and noyous injuries,
Till the fierce northern wind, with blustering blast,
Doth blow them quite away, and in the ocean cast.
In Lapland, their numbers have been compared to a flight of snow when
the flakes fall thickest, and the minor evil of being nearly suffocated
by smoke is endured to get rid of these little pests. Captain Stedman
says, that he and his soldiers were so tormented by gnats in America,
that they were obliged to dig holes in the ground with their bayonets,
and thrust their heads into them for protection and sleep. Humboldt
states, that "between the little harbour of Higuerote and the mouth
of the Rio-Unare, the wretched inhabitants are accustomed to stretch
themselves on the ground, and pass the night buried in the sand three
or four inches deep, exposing only the head, which they cover with a
handkerchief."
After enumerating these and other examples of the achievements of the
gnat and musquito tribe, Kirby says, "It is not therefore incredible
that Sapor, King of Persia, should have been compelled to raise the
siege of Nisibis by a plague of gnats, which attacked his elephants and
beasts of burden, and so caused the rout of his army; nor that the
inhabitants of various cities should, by an extraordinary multiplication
of this plague, have been compelled to desert them; nor that, by their
power of doing mischief, like other conquerors who have been the torment
of the human race, they should have attained to fame, and have given
their name to bays, town, and territories." _Ibid_.
_Leaf Caterpillars_.
The design of the caterpillars in rolling up the leaves is not only to
conceal themselves from birds and predatory insects, but also to protect
themselves from the cuckoo-flies, which lie in wait in every quarter to
deposit their eggs in their bodies, that their progeny may devour them.
Their mode of concealment, however, though it appear to be cunningly
contrived and skilfully executed, is not always successful, their
enemies often discovering their hiding place. We happened to see a
remarkable instance of this last summer (1828), in a case of one of the
lilac caterpillars which had changed into a chrysalis within the closely
folded leaf. A small cuckoo-fly, aware, it should seem, of the very spot
where the chrysalis lay within the leaf, was seen boring through it with
her ovipositor, and introducing her eggs through the punctures thus made
into the body of the dormant insect. We allowed her to lay all her eggs,
about six in number, and then put the leaf under an inverted glass. In a
few days the eggs of the cuckoo-fly were hatched, the grubs devoured the
lilac chrysalis, and finally changed into pupae in a case of yellow
silk, and into perfect insects like their parent.--_Library of
Entertaining Knowledge_.
The last extract, and all in the Library of Entertaining Knowledge
signed J.R. are written by Mr. J. Rennie, whose initials must be
familiar to every reader as attached to some of the most interesting
papers in Mr. Loudon's Magazines. He is a nice observer of Nature, and
one of the most popular writers on her phenomena.
As we treated the cuts of the last portion of the "Library of
Entertaining Knowledge," rather critically, we are happy to say that
the engravings of insects in the present part make ample amends for all
former imperfections in that branch of the work; some of the pupae,
insects, their nests, &c. are admirably executed, and their selection
is equally judicious and attractive.
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