31

"Fell Estrus buries in her rapid course Her countless brood in stag, or bull, or horse; Whose hungry larva eats its living way, Hatch'd by the warmth, and issues into day. The wing'd Ichneumon for her embryon young Gores with sharp horn the caterpillar throng. The cruel larva mines its silky course, And tears the vitals of its fostering nurse. While fierce Libellula with jaws of steel Ingulfs an insect-province at a meal; Contending bee-swarms rise on rustling wings, And slay their thousands with envenom'd stings.

"Yes! smiling Flora drives her armed car Through the thick ranks of vegetable war;

40

Fell Estrus buries, 1. 29. The gadfly, botfly, or sheep-fly: the larva lives in the bodies of cattle throughout the whole winter; it is extracted from their backs by an African bird called Buphaga. Adhering to the anus it artfully introduces itself into the intestines of horses, and becomes so numerous in their stomachs, as sometimes to destroy them; it climbs into the nostrils of sheep and calves, and producing a nest of young in a transparent hydatide

Herb, shrub, and tree, with strong emotions rise

For light and air, and battle in the skies;
Whose roots diverging with opposing toil
Contend below for moisture and for soil;
Round the tall Elm the flattering Ivies bend,
And strangle, as they clasp, their struggling
friend;

From Hunger's arms the shafts of Death are

hurl'd,

The wing'd Ichneumon, 1. 33. Linneus describes seventy-seven species of the ichneumon fly, some of which have a sting as long, and some twice as long as their bodies. Many of them insert their eggs into various caterpillars, which when they are hatched seem for a time to prey on the reservoir of silk in the backs of those animals designed for their own use to spin a cord to support them, or a bag to contain them, while they change from their larva form to a butterfly; as I have seen in above fifty cabbage caterpillars. The ichneumon larva then makes its way out of the caterpillar, and spins itself a small cocoon like a silk worm; these cocoons are about the size of a small pin's head, and I bave seen about ten of them on each cabbage caterpillar, which soon dies after their exclusion.

Other species of ichneumon insert their eggs into the aphis, and into the larva of the aphidivorous fly others into the bedeguar of rose trees, and the gall-nuts of oaks; whence those excrescences seem to be produced, as well as the hydatides in the frontal sinus of sheep and calves by the stimulus of the larvæ deposited in them. While fierce Libellula, 1. 37. The Libellula or Dragon-fly is said to be a most voracious animal; Linneus says in their perfect state they are the hawks to naked winged flies; in their larva state they run beneath the water, and are the cruel crocodiles of aquatic insects. Syst. Nat.

Contending bee-swarms, 1. 39. Stronger beeswarms frequently attack weak hives, and in two or three days destroy them and carry away their honey; this I once prevented by removing the attacked hive after the first day's battle to a distinct part of the garden. See Phytologia, Sect. XIV. 3.7.

world!

The shark rapacious, 1. 57. The shark has three rows of sharp teeth within each other, which he can bend downwards internally to admit larger prey, and raise to prevent its return; his snout hangs so far over his mouth, that he is necessitated to turn upon his back, when he takes fish that swim over him, and hence seems peculiarly formed to catch those that swim under him."

The crawling crocodiles, 1. 59. As this animal lives chiefly at the bottom of the rivers, which he frequents, he has the power of opening the upper jaw as well as the under one, and thus with greater facility catches the fish or waterfowl which swim over him.

One great slaughter-house, 1. 66. As vegetables are an inferior order of animals fixed to the soil; and as the locomotive animals prey upon them, or upon each other; the world may indeed be said to be one great slaughter-house. As the digested food of vegetables consists principally of sugar, and from this is produced again their mucilage, starch, and oil, and since animals are sustained by these vegetable productions, it would seem that the sugar-making process carried on in vegetable vessels was the great source of life to all organized beings. And that if our improved chemistry should ever discover the art of making sugar from fossile or aerial matter without the assistance of vegetation, food for animals would then become as plentiful as water, and they might live upon the earth without preying on each other, as thick as blades of grass, with no restraint to their numbers but the want of local room.

It would seem that roots fixed in the earth, and leaves innumerable waving in the air, were

necessary for the decomposition of water and air, and the conversion of them into saccharine matter, which would have been not only cumbrous but totally incompatible with the locomotion of animal bodies. For how could a man or quadruped have carried on his head or back a forest of leaves, or have had long branching lacteal or absorbent vessels terminating in the earth? Animals therefore subsist on vegetables; that is they take the matter so prepared, and have organs to prepare it further for the purposes of higher animation and greater sensibility.

While cold and hunger, 1. 71. Those parts of our system, which are in health excited into perpetual action, give us pain, when they are not excited into action: thus when the hands are for a time immersed in snow, an inaction of the cutaneous capillaries is induced, as is seen from the paleness of the skin, which is attended with the pain of coldness. So the pain of hunger is probably produced by the inaction of the muscular fibres of the stomach from the want of the stimulus of food.

Thus those, who have used much voluntary exertion in their early years, and have continued to do so, till the decline of life commences, if they then lay aside their employment, whether that of a minister of state, a general of an army, or a merchant, or manufacturer; they cease to have their faculties excited into their usual activity, and become unhappy, I suppose from the too great accumulation of the sensorial power of volition; which wants the accustomed stimulus or motive to cause its expenditure. Here laughs Ebriety, 1. 77.

uriously on the folly of their hearers: those who suffer under this insanity, are generally most innocent and harmless people, who are then liable to accuse themselves of the greatest imaginary crimes; and have so much intellectual cowardice, that they dare not reason about those things, which they are directed by their priests to believe. Where this intellectual cowardice is great, the voice of reason is ineffectual; but that of ridicule may save many from these mad-making doctors, as the farces of Mr. Foot; though it is too weak to cure those who are already hallucinated.

And last association, 1. 93. The miseries and the felicities of life may be divided into those which arise in consequence of irritation, sensation, volition, and association; and consist in the actions of the extremities of the nerves of sense, which constitute our ideas; if they are much more exerted than usual, or much less exerted than usual, they occasion pain; as when the finger is burnt in a candle; or when we go into a cold bath while their natural degree of exertion produces the pleasure of life or existence. This pleasure is nevertheless increased, when the system is stimulated into rather stronger action than usual, as after a copious dinner, and at the beginning of intoxication; and diminished, when it is only excited into somewhat less activity than usual, which is termed ennui, or irksomeness of life.

Ideal ills, 94. The tooth-edge is an instance of bodily pain occasioned by association of ideas. Every one in his childhood has repeatedly bit a part of the glass or earthen vessel, in which his food has been given him, and has thence had a disagreeable sensation in his teeth, attended at the same time with a jarring sound; and ever after, when such a sound is accidentally produced, the disagreeable sensation of the teeth follows by association of ideas; this is further elucidated in Zoonomia, Vol. I. Sect. XVI.

sings

The changeful state of sublunary things,
Bend o'er Mortality with silent sighs,

And wipe the secret tear-drops from my eyes,
Hear through the night one universal groan,
And mourn unseen for evils not my own,
With restless limbs and throbbing heart com-
plain,

eyes.

"With fond delight we feel the potent charm, When Zephyrs cool us, or when sun-beams

warm;

With airs volcanic, 1. 119. Those epidemic complaints, which are generally termed influenza, are believed to arise from vapours thrown out from earthquakes in such abundance as to affect large regions of the atmosphere, see Botanic Garden, Part I. Canto IV. 1. 65. while the diseases properly termed contagious originate from the putrid effluvia of decomposing animal or vegetable matter.

Sentimental pain, 1. 130. Children should be taught in their early education to feel for all the remediable evils, which they observe in others; but they should at the same time be taught sufficient firmness of mind not entirely to destroy their own happiness by their sympathizing with too great sensibility with the numerous irremediable evils, which exist in the present system of the world: as by indulging that kind of melancholy they decrease the sum total of public happiness; which is so far rather reprehensible than commendable. See Plan for Female Education by Dr. Darwin, Johnson, London, Sect. XVII.

This has been carried to great excess in the East by the disciples of Confucius; the Gentoos during a famine in India refused to eat the flesh of cows and of other animals to satisfy their

And

hunger, and save themselves from death. at other times they have been said to permit fleas and musquitoes to feed upon them from this erroneous sympathy.

From wandering atoms, 1. 147. Had those ancient philosophers, who contended that the world was formed from atoms, ascribed their combinations to certain immutable properties received from the hand of the Creator, such as general gravitation, chemical affinity, or animal appetency, instead of ascribing them to a blind chance; the doctrine of atoms, as constituting or composing the material world by the variety of their combinations, so far from leading the mind to atheism, would strengthen the demonstration of the existence of a Deity, as the first cause of all things; because the analogy resulting from our perpetual experience of cause and effect would have thus been exemplified through universal nature.

The varied landscape, 1. 160. The pleasure we feel on examining a fine landscape, is derived from various sources; as first the excitement

of the retina of the eye into certain quantities of action; which when there is in the optic nerve any accumulation of sensorial power, is always agreeable. 2. When it is excited into such successive actions, as relieve each other; as when a

limb has been long exerted in one direction, by stretching it in another; as described in Zoonomia, Sect. XL. 6. on ocular spectra. 3. And lastly by the associations of its parts with some agreeable sentiments or tastes, as of sublimity, beauty, utility, novelty; and the objects suggesting other sentiments, which have lately been termed picturesque as mentioned in the note to Canto III. 1. 230 of this work. The two former of these sources of pleasure arise from irritation, the last from association.

We drink delighted, 1. 178. The pleasure we experience from music, is, like that from viewing a landscape, derived from various sources; as first from the excitement of the auditory nerve into certain quantities of action, when there exists any accumulation of sensorial power. 2. When the auditory nerve is exerted in such successive actions as relieve each other, like stretching or yawning, as described in Botanic Garden, Part II. Interlude the third, these successions of sound are termed melody, and their combinations harmony. 3. From the repetition of sounds at certain intervals of time; as we hear them with greater facility and accuracy, when we expect them; because they are then excited by volition, as well as by irritation, or at least the tympanum is then better adapted to assist their production; hence the two musical times or bars; and hence the rhimes in poetry give pleasure, as well as the measure of the verse and lastly the pleasure we receive from music, arises from the associations of agreeable sentiments with certain proportions, or repetitions, or quantities, or times of sounds which have been previously acquired; as explained in Zoonomia, Vol. I. Sect. XVI. 10. and Sect. XXII. 2.

Seraphic sounds enchant this nether sphere; And listening angels lean from Heaven to hear.

"Next by sensation led, new joys commence From the fine movements of the excited sense; In swarms ideal urge their airy flight, Adorn the day-scenes, and illume the night. Her spells o'er all the hand of Fancy flings, Gives form and substance to unreal things; With fruits and foliage decks the barren waste, And brightens Life with sentiment and taste; Pleased o'er the level and the rule presides, 191 The painter's brush, the sculptor's chissel guides,

With ray ethereal lights the poet's fire,

Tunes the rude pipe, or strings the heroic lyre : Charm'd round the nymph on frolic footsteps