 Section 43 of Micrographia. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by John Brandon. Micrographia by Robert Hook. Observation 38 of the structure and motion of the wings of flies. The wings of all kinds of insects are for the most part very beautiful objects and afford no less pleasing an object to the mind to speculate upon than to the eye to behold. This of the blue fly among the rest wants not its peculiar ornaments and contrivances. It grows out of the thorax or middle part of the body of a fly and is seated a little behind the center of gravity in the body. Towards the head. But that eccentrically is curiously balanced. First by the expanded area of the wings which lies all more backwards than the root. By the motion of them whereby the center of the vibration is much more backwards towards the tail of the fly than the root of the wing is. What the vibrative motion of the wing is and after what manner they are moved I have endeavored by many trials to find out and first for the manner of their motion. I endeavored to observe several of those kind of small spinning flies which will naturally suspend themselves as it were poised and steady in one place of the air without rising or falling or moving forwards or backwards. For by looking down on those I could by a kind of faint shadow perceive the utmost extremes of the vibrative motion of their wings which shadow whilst they so endeavor to suspend themselves was not very long. But when they endeavor to fly forwards it was somewhat longer. Next I tried it by fixing the legs of a fly upon the top of the stalk of a feather with glue, wax, etc. and then making it endeavor to fly away. For being thereby able to view it in any posture I collected that the motion of the wing was after this manner. The extreme limits of the vibrations were usually somewhat about the length of the body distant from one another often times shorter and sometimes also longer. But the foremost limit was usually a little above the back and the hinder somewhat beneath the belly. Between which two limits if one may guess by the sound the wing seemed to be moved forwards and backwards with an equal velocity and if one may from the shadow or faint representation the wings afforded and from the consideration of the nature of the thing guess at the posture or manner of the wings moving between them it seemed to be this the wing being supposed placed in the utmost limit seems to be put so that the plane of it lies almost horizontal. But only the four part does dip a little or is somewhat more depressed. This position is the wing vibrated or moved to the lower limit being almost arrived at the lower limit. The hinder part of the wing moving somewhat faster than the former. The area of the wing begins to dip behind and in that posture seems it to be moved to the upper limit back again and then back again in the first posture. The former part of the area dipping again as it is moved downwards by means of the quicker motion of the main stem which terminates or edges the four part of the wing. And these vibrations or motions to and fro between the two limits seems so swift that is very probable from the sound that affords. If it be compared with the vibration of a musical string tuned unison to it, it makes many hundreds if not some thousands of vibrations in a second minute of time. And if we may be allowed to guess by the sound the wing of a bee is yet more swift or the tone is much more acute. And that in all likelihood proceeds from the exceeding swift beating of the air by the small wing. And it seems the more likely to because the wing of a bee is less in proportion to its body than the other wing to the body of a fly. So that for all I know it may be one of the quickest vibrating spontaneous motions of any in the world. And though perhaps there may be many flies in other places that afford a yet more shrill note with their wings yet is more probable that the quickest vibrating spontaneous motion is to be found in the wing of some creature. Now if we consider the exceeding quickness of these animal spirits that must cause these motions, we cannot choose but admire the exceeding vividness of the governing faculty or anima of the insect which is able to dispose and regulate so the motor facilities just to cause every peculiar organ not only to move or act so quick but to do it also so regularly. Whilst I was examining and considering the curious mechanism of the wings, I observed that under the wings of most kind of flies, bees, etc. There were placed certain pendulums or extended drops as I may so call them from their resembling motion and figure where they much resembled a long hanging drop of some transparent viscous liquor. And I observed them constantly to move just before the wings of the fly began to move. So that at the first sight I could not but guess that there was some excellent use as to the regulation of the motion of the wing and did fancy that it might be something like the handle of a cock which by vibrating to and fro might as twir open and shut the cock and thereby give a passage to the determinant influences into the muscles. Afterwards upon some other trials I suppose that they might be for some use in respiration which for many reasons I suppose those animals to use and me thought it was not very improbable but that they might have convenient passages under the wings for the emitting at least of the air if not admitting as in the gills of fishes is most evident or perhaps this pendulum might be somewhat like the staff of a pump whereby these creatures might exercise their analogous lungs and not only draw in but force out the air they live by but these were but conjectures and upon further examination seemed less probable. The fabric of the wing as it appears through a moderately magnifying microscope seems to be a body consisting of two parts as is visible in the four figure of the twenty three scheme and by the two figure of the twenty six scheme. The one is a quilly or finny substance consisting of several long slender and variously blended quills or wires something resembling the veins of leaves these are as were the fins or quills which stiffen the whole area and keep the other part to standard which is a very thin transparent skin or membrane variously folded and planted but not very regularly and is besides exceeding thickly be stuck with innumerable small bristles which are only perceptible by a bigger magnifying microscope and not with that neither but with a very convenient augmentation of skylight projected on the object with a burning glass as I have elsewhere showed and by looking through it against the light. Instead of the small hairs in several other flies there are infinite of small feathers which cover both the under and upper sides of this thin film as in almost all the sorts of butterflies and moths and those small parts are not only shaped very much like the feathers of birds would like those very gated with all the variety of curious bright and vivid colors imaginable and those feathers are likewise so admirably and delicately range as to compose very fine flourishings and ornamental paintings like turkey and Persian carpets but a far more surpassing beauty as is evident enough to the naked eye in the painted wings of butterflies but much more through an ordinary microscope intermingle likewise with these hairs maybe perceived multitudes of little pits or black spots in the extended membrane which seem to be the root of the hairs that grow on the other side. These two bodies seem dispersed over the whole surface of the wing. The hairs are best perceived by looking through it against the light or by laying the wing upon a very white piece of paper in a convenient light for thereby every little hair most manifestly appears a specimen of which you may observe drawn in the fourth figure of the twenty three scheme ABCDEF where of represent some parts of the bones or quills of the wing each of which you may perceive to be covered over with a multitude of scales or bristles the former AB is the biggest stem of all the wing and maybe properly enough called the cut air it being that which terminates and stiffens the foremost edge of the wing the fore edge of this is armed with a multitude of little bristles or tenter hooks in some standing regular and in order in others not all the points of which are directed from the body towards the tip of the wing nor is this edge only thus fringed but even all the whole edge of the wing is covered with a small fringe consisting of short and more slender bristles this subject had a time would afford excellent matter for the contemplation of the nature of wings and flying but because I may perhaps get a more convenient time to prosecute that speculation and recollect several observations that I have made of that particular I shall at present proceed to end of section forty three recording by John Brandon section forty four of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org micrographia by Robert Hook section forty four observation thirty nine of the eyes and head of a great drone fly and of several other creatures I took a large great drone fly that had a large head but a small and slender body in proportion to it and cutting off its head I fixed it with the four part or face upwards upon my object plate this I made choice of rather than the head of a great blue fly because my inquiry being now about the eyes I found this fly to have first the biggest cluster of eyes in proportion to his head of any small kind of flies that I have yet seen it being somewhat inclining towards the make of the large dragon flies next because there is a greater variety in the knobs or balls of each cluster than is of any small fly then examining it according to my usual manner by varying the degrees of light and altering its position to each kind of light I drew that representation of it which is delineated in the twenty fourth scheme and found these things to be as plain and evident as notable and pleasant first that the greatest part of the face nay of the head was nothing else but two large and protuberant bunches or prominent parts a b c d e a the surface of each of which was all covered over or shaped into a multitude of small hemispheres placed in a triagonal order that being the closest and most compacted and in that order ranged over the whole surface of the eye in very lovely rows between each of which as is necessary were left long and regular trenches the bottoms of every of which were perfectly entire and not at all perforated or drilled through which I most certainly was assured of by the regularly reflected image of certain objects which I moved to and fro between the head and the light and by examining the cornea or outward skin after I had stripped it off from the several substances that lay within it and by looking both upon the inside and against the light next that of those multitudes of hemispheres there were observable two degrees of bigness the half of them that were lower most and look towards the ground or their own legs namely c d e c d e being a pretty deal smaller than the other namely a b c e a b c e is that looked upward and sideways or for right and backward which variety I have not found in any other small fly thirdly that every one of these hemispheres as they seem to be pretty near the true shape of a hemisphere so was the surface exceeding smooth and regular reflecting as exact regular and perfect an image of any object from the surface of them as a small ball of quick silver of that bigness would do but nothing near so vivid the reflection from these being very languid much like the reflection from the outside of water glass crystal etc in so much that in each of these hemispheres I have been able to discover a landscape of those things which lay before my window one thing of which was a large tree whose trunk and top I could plainly discover as I could also the parts of my window and my hand and fingers if I held it between the window and the object a small draught of 19 of which as they appeared in the bigger magnifying glass to reflect the image of the two windows of my chamber are delineated in the figure three of the 23rd scheme for sleep that these rows were so disposed that there was no quarter visible from his head that there was not some of these hemispheres directed against so that the fly maybe truly said to have an eye every way and to be really circumspect and it was further observable that that way where the trunk of his body did hinder his prospect backward these protuberances were elevated as it were above the plane of his shoulders and back so that he was able to see backwards also over his back fifthly in living flies I have observed that when any small mode or dust which flies up and down the air chances to light upon any part of these knobs as it is short stick firmly to it and not fall though through the microscope it appears like a large stone or stick which one would admire especially since it is no way is probable that there is any wet or gluttonous matter upon these hemispheres but I hope I shall render the reason in another place so the fly presently makes use of his two four feet instead of eyelids with which as with two brooms or brushes they being all bestuck with bristles he often sweeps or brushes off whatever hinders the prospect of any of his hemispheres and then to free his legs from that dirt he rubs them one against another the point and bristles or tenders of which looking both on way the rubbing of them to and through one against another does cleans them in the same manner as I have observed those that card wool to cleanse their cards by placing their cards so as the teeth of both looks the same way and then rubbing them one against another in the very same manner do they brush and cleans their bodies and wings as I shall buy and buy show other creatures have other contrivances for the cleansing and clearing their eyes sixly that the number of the pearls or hemispheres in the clusters of this fly was near 14000 which I judged by numbering certain rows of them several ways and costing up the whole content accounting each cluster to contain about 7000 pearls 3000 of which were of a size and consequently the rose not so thick and the 4000 I accounted to be the number of the smaller pearls next to feet and proboscis and their animals I observed to have yet a greater number as the dragonfly or other world and others to have a much less company as an ant etc and several other small flies and insects seventhly that the order of these eyes or hemispheres was altogether curious and admirable they being placed in all kinds of flies and aerial animals in a most curious and regular ordination of triangular rows in which order they arranged the nearest together that possibly they can and consequently leave the least pits or trenches between them but in shrimps crawfishes lobsters and such kinds of crustaceous water animals I have yet observed them ranged in a quadrangular order the rows cutting each other at right angles which as it admits of a less number of pearls in equal surfaces though have those creatures a recompense made them by having their eyes a little movable in their heads which the other altogether want so infinitely wise and provident do we find all the dispensations in nature that certainly Epicurus and his followers must very little have considered them who ascribed those things to the production of chance that will to a more attentive consider appear the products of the highest wisdom and providence upon the anatomy or dissection of the head I observed these particulars first that this outward skin like the cornea of the eyes of the greater animals was both flexible and transparent and seemed through the microscope perfectly to resemble the very substance of the cornea of a man's eye for having cut out the cluster and removed the dark and nuclear stock that is adjacent to it I could see it transparent like a thin piece of skin having as many cavities in the inside of it and ranged in the same order as it had protuberances on the outside and this propriety I found the same in all the animals that had it whether flies or shellfish secondly I found that all animals that I have observed with those kind of eyes have within this cornea a certain clear liquor or juice though in a very little quantity and I observed certainly that within that clear liquor they had a kind of dark mucous lining which was all spread round within the cavity of the clutter and seemed very near adjoining to it the color of which in some flies was gray in others black in others red in others of a mixed color in others spotted and that the whole clusters when looked on whilst the animal was living or but newly killed appeared of the same color that his coat as I may so call it appeared of when that outward skin or cornea was removed fourthly that the rest of the capacity of the clusters was in some as in drug and flies etc hollow or empty in others filled with some kind of substance in blue flies with the reddish musculos substance with fibers tending from the center or bottom outwards and diverse other with various and differing kinds of substances that this curious contrivance is the organ of sight to all those various crustaceous animals which are furnished with it I think we need not doubt if we consider but the several congruities it has with the eyes of greater creatures at first that it is furnished with a cornea with a transparent humor and with a uvea or retina that the figure of each of the small hemispheres are very spherical exactly polished and most vivid lively and plump when the animal is living as in greater animals and in like manner dull flaccid and irregular or shrunk when the animal is dead next that those creatures that are furnished with it have no other organs that have any resemblance to the known eyes of other creatures thirdly that those which they call the eyes of crabs, lobsters, shrimps and the like and are really so are hemispheres almost in the same manner as those of flies are and that they really are so I have very often tried by cutting off these little movable knobs and putting the creature again into the water that it would swim to and throw and move up and down as well as before but would often hit itself against the rocks or stones and though I put my hand just before its head it would not at all start or fly back till I touched it whereas whilst those were remaining it would start back and avoid my hand or a stick at a good distance before it touched it and if in crustaceous sea animals then it seems very probable also that these knobs are the eyes in crustaceous insects which are also of the same kind only in a higher and more active element this the conformity or congruity of many other parts common to either of them will strongly argue their crustaceous armour, their number of legs which are six besides the two great claws which answer to the wings of insects and in all kind of spiders as also in many other insects that want wings which I'll find the complete number of them and not only the number but the very shape figure joints and claws of lobsters and crabs as is evident by scorpions and spiders as is visible in the second figure of the 31st scheme and in the little mite worm which I call a land crab described in the second figure of the 33rd scheme but in their manner of generation being oviparous etc. and it were a very worthy observation whether there be not some kinds of transformation and metamorphosis in the several states of crustaceous water animals as there is in several sorts of insects for if such could be met with the progress of the variations could be much more conspicuous in those larger animals than they can be in any kind of insects our colder climate affords these being their eyes it affords us a very pretty speculation to contemplate their manner of vision which as it is very differing from that of biocular animals so is it not less admirable that each of these pearls or hemispheres is a perfect eye I think we need not doubt if we consider only the outside or figure of any one of them for they being each of them covered with a transparent protuberant cornea and containing a liquor within them resembling the watery or glassy humours of the eye must necessarily refract all the parallel rays that fall on them out of the air into a point not far distant within them where in all probability the retina of the eye is placed and that opatious dark and mocos inward coat that I formally showed I found to subtend the concave part of the cluster is very likely to be that tunical or coat it appearing through the microscope to be placed a little more than a diameter of those pearls below or within the tunica cornea and if so then is there in all probability a little picture or image of the objects without painted or made at the bottom of the retina against every one of those pearls so that there are as many impressions on the retina or opaque skin as there are pearls or hemispheres on the cluster but because it is impossible for any protuberant surface whatsoever whether spherical or other so to refract the rays that come from far remote lateral points of any object as to collect them again and unite them each in a distinct point and that only those rays which come from some point that lies in the axis of the figure produced are so accurately refracted to one and the same point again and that the lateral rays the further they are removed the more imperfect is their refracted confluence it follows therefore that only the picture of those parts of the external objects lie in or near the axis of each hemisphere are discernibly painted or made on the retina of each hemisphere and that therefore each of them can distinctly sense it or see only those parts which are very near perpendicularly opposed to it or lie in or near its optic axis now through there maybe by each of those eye pearls a representation to the animal of a whole hemisphere in the same manner as in a man's eye there is a picture or sensation in the retina of all the objects lying almost in a hemisphere yet as in a man's eye also there are but some very few points which lying in or near the optic axis are distinctly discerned so there may be multitudes of pictures made of one object in the several pearls and yet but one or some very few that are distinct the representation of any object that is made in any other pearl but that which is directly or very near directly opposed being altogether confused and unable to produce a distinct vision so that we see that though it has pleased the all-wise creator to induce this creature with such multitudes of eyes yet has he not induced it with the faculty of seeing more than other creature for various this cannot move his head at least can move it very little without moving his whole body biocular creatures can in an instant or the twinkling of an eye which being very quick is vulgarly used in the same signification moves their eyes so as to direct the optic axis to any point nor is it probable that they are able to see attentively at one more time more than one physical point for though there be a distinct image made in every eye yet it is very likely that the observing faculty is only employed about someone object for which they have most concern now as we accurately distinguish the sight or position of an object by the motion of the muscles of the eye requisite to put the optic line in a direct position and confusedly by the position of the imperfect picture of the object at the bottom of the eye so are these crustaceous creatures able to judge confusedly of the position of objects by the picture or impression made at the bottom of the opposite pearl and distinctly by the removal of the attentive or observing faculty from one pearl to another but what this faculty is as it requires another place so a much deeper speculation now because it were impossible even with this multitude of eyeballs to see any object distinct for as I hinted before only those parts that lay in or very near the optic lines could be so the infinitely wise creator has not left the creature without the power of moving the head a little in aerial crustaceous animals and the very eyes also in crustaceous sea animals so that by these means they are enabled to direct some optic line or other against any object and by that means they have the visive faculty as complete as any animal that can move its eyes distances of objects also it is very likely they distinguish partly by the consonant impressions made in some two convenient pearls one in each cluster for according as those congruent impressions affect through pearls nearer approach to each other the nearer is the object and the farther they are distant the more distant is the object partly also by the alteration of each pearl requisite to make the sensation or picture perfect for it is impossible that the pictures of two objects distant can be perfectly painted or made on the same retina or bottom of the eye not altered as will be very evident to anyone that shall attentively consider the nature of reflection now whether this alteration may be in the figure of the cornea in the motion of access or recess of the retina towards the cornea or in the alteration of a crustal and humor if such there be I pretend not to determine though I think we need not doped but that there may be as much curiosity of contrivance and structure in every one of those pearls as in the eye of a whale or elephant and the almighty's fiat could as easily cause the existence of the one as the other and as one day in a thousand years are the same with him so may one eye and ten thousand this we may be sure of that the filaments or sensitive parts of the retina must be most exceedingly curious and minute since the whole picture itself is such what must needs the component parts be of that retina which distinguishes the part of an object's picture that must be many millions of millions less than that in a man's eye and how exceeding curious and subtile must the component parts of the medium that conveys light be when we find the instrument made for its reception or reflection to be so exceedingly small we may I think from this speculation be sufficiently discouraged from hoping to discover by any optic or other instrument the determinate bulk of the parts of the medium that conveys the pulse of light since we find that there is not less accurateness shown in the figure and polish of those exceedingly minute lenticular surfaces than in those more large and conspicuous surfaces of our own eyes and yet can I not doubt but that there is a determinate bulk of those parts since I find them unable to enter between the parts of Mercury which being in motion must necessarily have pores as I shall elsewhere show and here pass by as being a digression as concerning the horns ff the feelers or smellers gg the proboscis age age and I the hairs and bristles kk I shall endeavor to describe in the observation forty two End of chapter forty four Section forty five of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Devorah Allen micrographia by Robert Hook section forty five observation forty of the teeth of a snail I have little more to add of the teeth of a snail besides the picture of it which is represented in the first figure of the twenty-fifth scheme save that his bended body A B C D E F which seemed fashioned very much like a row of small teeth orderly placed in the gums and looks as if it were divided into several smaller and greater black teeth was nothing but one small bended hard bone which was placed in the upper jaw of the mouth of a house snail with which I observe this very snail to feed on the leaves of a rose tree and to bite out pretty large and half round bits not unlike the figure of a C nor very much differing from it in bigness the upper part A B C D of this bone I found to be much wider and to grow out of the upper chap of the snail G G G and not to be anything near so much creased as the lower and blacker part of it H I I H K K H which was exactly shaped like teeth the bone growing thinner or tapering to an edge towards K K K it seemed to have nine teeth or prominent parts I K I K I F etc which were joined together by the thinner interposed parts of the bone the animal to which these teeth belong is a very anomalous creature and seems of a kind quite distinct from any other terrestrial animal or insect the anatomy whereof exceedingly different from what has been hitherto given of it I should have inserted but that it will be more proper in another place I have never met with any kind of animal whose teeth are all joined in one save only that I lately observed that all the teeth of a rhinocerat which grow on either side of its mouth are joined into one large bone the weight of one of which I found to be near 11 pound Hover du Pois so that it seems one of the biggest sort of terrestrial animals as well as one of the smallest which has his teeth thus shaped end of section 45 described in the second figure of the 25th Scheme afford a pretty object for a microscope that magnifies very much especially if it be bright whether in the light of a window be cast or collected on it by a deep convex glass or water ball but then the whole surface of the shell may be perceived all covered over with exceeding small pits or cavities with interposed edges almost in the manner of the surface of a poppy seed but that these holes are not in hundredth part scarce of their bigness the shell when the young ones were hatched which I found an easy thing to do if the eggs were kept in a warm place appeared no thicker in proportion to its bulk than that of an hens or goose's egg is to its bulk and all the shell appeared very white which seemed to proceed from its transparency once all those pittings did almost vanish so that they could not without much difficulty be discerned the inside of the shell seemed to be lined also with a kind of thin film not unlike keeping the proportion to its shell that with which the shell of an hen egg is lined and the shell itself seemed like common eggshells very brittle and cracked and divers others of these eggs I could plainly enough through the shell perceive the small insect like coily around the edges of the shell the shape of the egg itself the figure pretty well represents though by default of the graver it does not appear so rounded and lying above the paper as it were as it ought to do that is it was for the most part pretty oval end way somewhat like an egg but the other way it was a little flatted on two opposite sides divers of these eggs is as common to most others I found to be barren or adult for they never afforded any young ones and those I usually found much wider than the other that were prolific the eggs of other kinds of oviparous insects I have found to be perfectly round every way like so many globules of this sort I have observed some sorts of spider's eggs and chancing the last summer to enclose a very large and curiously painted butterfly in a box intending to examine its gaudery with my microscope I found within a day or two after I enclosed her almost all the inner surface of the box covered over with an infinite of exactly round eggs which were stuck very fast to the sides of it and in so exactly regular and close in order that made me call to mind my hypothesis which I had formally thought on for the making out of all the regular figures of salt which I have elsewhere hinted for here I found all of them ranged into a most exact triagonal order much after the manner as the hemispheres are placed on the eye of a fly all which eggs I found after a little time to be hatched and out of them to come a multitude of small worms resembling young silkworms leaving all their thin hollow shells behind them sticking on the box in their triagonal posture these I found with the microscope to have much such a substance as the silkworm's eggs but could not perceive them pitted and indeed there is this great a variety in the shape of the eggs of oviparous insects as among those of birds of these eggs a large and lusty fly will at one time lay near four or five hundred so that the increase of these kind of insects must needs be very prodigious were they not preyed on by multitudes of birds and destroyed by frosts and rains hence tis those hotter climates between the tropics are infested with such multitudes of locusts and such other vermin End of Section 46 Recording by Philip Gould Section 47 of Micrographia This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Micrographia by Robert Hooke Observation 42 of a blue fly This kind of fly, whereof a microscopial picture is delineated in the first figure of the 26th Scheme is a very beautiful creature and has many things about it very notable divers of which I have already partly described namely the feet, wings, eyes and head in the preceding observations and though the head before described be that of a grey drone fly yet for the main it is very agreeable to this the things wherein they differ most will be easily enough found by the following particulars First, the clusters of eyes of this fly are very much smaller than those of the drone fly in proportion to the head and next all the eyes of each cluster seem much of the same bigness one with another not differing as the other but ranged in the same triagonal order thirdly between these two clusters there was a scaly prominent front bee which was armed and adorned with large tapering sharp black bristles which growing out in rows on either side were so bent toward each other near the top as to make a kind of arched arbor of bristles which almost covered the former front fourthly, at the end of this arch about the middle of the face on a prominent part C grew two small oblong bodies D.D. which through a microscope look not unlike the pendants and lilies these seem to be jointed onto two small parts at C each of which seemed again jointed into the front fifthly, out of the upper part and outside of these horns as I may call them from the figure they are of in the twenty-fourth scheme where they are marked with F.F. there grows a single feather or brushy bristle E.E. somewhat of the same kind with the tufts of a net which I have before described what the use of these kind of horned and tufted bodies should be I cannot well imagine unless they serve for smelling or hearing though how they are adapted for either it seems very difficult to describe they are in almost every several kind of flies of so various a shape though certainly they are some very essential part of the head and have some very notable office assigned them by nature since in all insects they are to be found in one or another form sixthly at the under part of the face F.F. were several of the former sort of bended bristles and below all the mouth out of the middle of which grew the proboscis G.H.I which by means of several joints where of it seemed to consist the fly was able to move to and fro and thrusted in and out as it pleased the end of this hollow body which was all over covered with small short hairs or bristles was as T.W. bended H. and the outer or foremost side of the bended part H.I slit as it were into two chaps H.I. H.I all the outside of which were covered with hairs in pretty large bristles these he could like two chaps very readily open and shut and when he seemed to suck anything from the surface of a body he would spread abroad these chaps and apply the hollow part of them very close to it from either side of the proboscis within the mouth grew two other small horns or fingers K.K. which were hairy but small in this figure but of another shape and bigger in proportion in the twenty fourth scheme where they are marked with G.G. which two indeed seemed a kind of smellers but whether so or not I cannot positively determine the thorax or middle part of this fly was cased both above and beneath with a very firm crust of armor the upper part more round and covered over with long conical bristles all whose ends pointed backwards out of the hindre and under part of this grew out in a cluster six legs three of which are apparent in the figure the other three were hid by the body placed in that posture the legs were all much of the same make being all of them covered with a strong hairy scale or shell just like the legs of a crab or lobster and the contrivance of the joints seemed much the same each leg seemed made up of eight parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight to the eighth or last of which grew the soles and claws described before in the 38th observation out of the upper part of this trunk grew the two wings which I mentioned in the 38th observation consisting of a film extended on certain small stiff wires or bones these in a blue fly were much longer than the body but in other kind of flies they are of very differing proportions to the body these films and many flies were so thin that like several other plated bodies mentioned in the 9th observation they afforded all varieties of fantastical or transient colors the reason of which I have here endeavored to explain they seem to receive their nourishment from the stalks or wires which seem to be hollow and near the upper part of the wing LL several of them seem jointed the shape of which will sufficiently appear by the black lines in the second figure of the 26th scheme which is a delineation of one of those wings expanded directly to the eyes all the hinder part of its body is covered with the most curious blue shining armor looking exactly like a polished piece of steel brought to that blue color by annealing all which armor is very thick be stuck with abundance of tapering bristles such as grow on its back as is visible enough by the figure nor was the inside of this creature less beautiful than its outside for cutting off a part of the belly and then viewing it to see if I could discover any vessels such as are to be found in a greater animals and even in snails exceedingly manifestly I found much beyond my expectation that there were abundance of branchings of milk white vessels no less curious than the branchings of veins and arteries in bigger terrestrial animals in one of which I found two notable branches joining their two main stalks as it were into one common ductus now to what veins or arteries these vessels were analogous whether to the Veena Porta or the Messereg vessels or the like or indeed whether they were veins and arteries or Vassa Lactea properly so called I am not hitherto able to determine having not yet made sufficient inquiry but in all particulars there seems not to be anything less of curious contrivance in these insects than in those larger terrestrial animals for I had never seen any more curious branchings of vessels than those I observed in two or three of these flies thus opened it is a creature active in nimble so as there are few creatures like it whether bigger or smaller in so much that it will escape and avoid a small body though coming on it exceedingly swiftly and if it sees anything approaching it which it fears it presently squats down as it were that it may be the more ready for its rise nor is it less hardy in the winter than active in the summer enduring all the frosts and surviving till the next summer not withstanding the bitter cold of our climate nay this creature will endure to be frozen and yet not be destroyed for I have taken one of them out of the snow whereon it had been frozen almost white with the ice about it and yet by thawing it gently by the warmth of a fire it has quickly revived and flown about this kind of fly seems by the steams or taste of fermenting and putrefying meat which it often kisses as twer with its proboscis as it trips over it to be stimulated or excited to eject its eggs or seed on it perhaps from the same reason as dogs, cats and many other brute creatures are excited to their particular lusts by the smell of their females when by nature prepared for generation the males seeming by those kind of smells or other incitations to be as much necessitated thereto as aqua regus strongly impregnated with the solution of gold is forced to precipitate it by the effusion of spirit of urine or a solution of salt of tartar one of these put in spirit of wine was very quickly seemingly killed and both its eyes and mouth began to look very red but upon the taking of it out and suffering it to lie three or four hours and heating it with the sunbeams cast through a burning glass it again revived seeming as it were to have been but dead drunk and after certain hours to grow fresh again and sober end of section 47 recording by Philip Gould section 48 of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org micrographia by Robert Hook observation 43 of the water insect or NAT this little creature described in the first figure of the 27th scheme was a small scaled or crusted animal which I have often observed to be generated in rainwater I have also observed it both in pond and river water it is supposed by some to deduce its first original from the putrefaction of rainwater in which if it have stood any time open to the air you shall seldom miss all the summer long of store of them frisking to and fro it is a creature wholly differing in shape from any I ever observed nor is its motion less strange it has a very large head in proportion to its body all covered with a shell like other testacious animals but it differs in this that it has up and down several parts of it with two tufts of hairs or bristles placed in the order expressed in the figure it has two horns which seemed almost like the horns of an ox inverted and as near as I could guess were hollow with tufts of bristles likewise at the top these horns they could move easily this or that way and might per chance be their nostrils it has a pretty large mouth which seem contrived much like those of crabs and lobsters by which I have often observed them to feed on water or some imperceptible nutritive substance in it I could perceive through the transparent shell while the animals survived several motions in the head, thorax, and belly very distinctly of differing kinds which I may perhaps elsewhere endeavor more accurately to examine and to show of how great benefit the use of a microscope may be for the discovery of nature's course and the operations performed in animal bodies by which we have the opportunity of observing her through these delicate and pellucid teguments of the bodies of insects acting according to her usual course and way undisturbed whereas when we endeavor to pry into her secrets by breaking open the doors upon her and dissecting and mangling creatures whilst there is life yet within them we find her indeed at work but put into such disorder by the violence offered as it may easily be imagined how differing a thing we find if we could as we can with a microscope and these smaller creatures quietly peep in at the windows without frightening her out of her usual bias the form of the whole creature as it appeared in the microscope may without troubling you with more descriptions be plainly enough perceived by the scheme the hinder part or belly consisting of eight several jointed parts namely A B C D E F G H of the first figure from the midst of each of which on either side issued out three or four small bristles or hairs I I I I I the tail was divided into two parts of very differing make one of them namely K having many tufts of hair or bristles which seemed to serve both for the fins and tail for the oars and rudder of this little creature wherewith it was able by frisking and bending its body nimbly to and fro to move himself any wither and to skull and steer himself as he pleased the other part L seemed to be as toward the ninth division of his belly and had many single bristles on either side from the end V of which through the whole belly there was a kind of gut of a darker color M M M wherein by certain peristaltic motions there was a kind of black substance moved upwards and downwards through it from the orbicular part of it in which seemed the ventricle or stomach to the tail V and so back again which peristaltic motion I have observed also in a louse, a nat and several other kinds of transparent-bodied flies the thorax or chest of this creature O O O O was thick and short and pretty transparent to see the white heart which is the color also of the blood in these and most other insects to beat and several other kind of motions it was bestuck and adorned up and down with several tufts of bristles such as are pointed out by P P P P the head Q was likewise bestuck with several of those tufts S S S it was broad and short had two black eyes T T purled as they afterwards appeared and two small horns R R such as I formally described both its motion and rest is very strange and pleasant and differing from those of most other creatures I have observed for where it ceases from moving its body the tail of it seeming much lighter than the rest of its body and a little lighter than the water it swims in presently boys it up to the top of the water where it hangs suspended with the head always downward and like our antipodes if they do by a frisk get below that superficies they presently ascend again unto it if they cease moving until they tread as it were under that superficies with their tails the hanging of these in this posture put me in mind of a certain creature I have seen in London that was brought out of America which would very firmly suspend itself by the tail with the head downwards and was said to keep in that posture with her young ones in her false belly which is a purse provided by nature for the production nutrition and preservation of her young ones which is described by Piso in the 24th chapter of the fifth book of his natural history of Brazil the motion of it was with the tail forwards drawing itself backwards by the striking to and fro of that tuft which grew out of one of the stumps of its tail it had another motion which was more suitable to that of other creatures and that is with the head forward for by moving of his chaps if I may so call the parts of his mouth it was able to move itself downwards very gently towards the bottom and did his tour eat up its way through the water but that which was most observable in this creature was its metamorphosis or change for having kept several of these animals in a glass of rainwater in which they were produced I found after about a fortnight or three weeks keeping that several of them flew away in gnats leaving their husks behind them in the water floating under the surface the place where these animals were want to reside whilst they were inhabitants of the water this made me more diligently watch them to see if I could find them at the time of their transformation and not long afterwards I observed several of them to be changed into an unusual shape wholly differing from that they were of before their head and body being grown more but not broader and their belly or hindre parts smaller and coiled about this great body much of the fashion represented by the pricked line in the second figure of the twenty-seven scheme the head and horns now swim uppermost and the whole bulk of the body seemed to be grown much lighter for when by my frightening of it it would by frisking out of its tail in the manner expressed in the figure by BC sink itself below the surface towards the bottom the body would more swiftly re-ascend than when it was in its former shape I still marked its progress from time to time and found its body still to grow bigger and bigger nature as it were fitting and accouttering it for the lighter element of which it was now going to be an inhabitant for by my observing one of these with my microscope I found the eyes of it to be altogether differing from what they seemed before appearing now all over purled or knobbed like the eyes of gnats as is visible in the second figure by A at length I saw part of this creature to swim above and part beneath the surface of the water below which though it would quickly plunge itself if I by any means frighted it and presently re-ascend into its former posture after a little longer expectation I found that the head and body of a net began to appear and stand clear above the surface and by degrees it drew out its legs first the two foremost than the other at length its whole body perfect and entire appeared out of the husk which it left in the water standing on its legs upon the top of the water and by degrees it began to move and after flew about the glass a perfect net I have been the more particular enlarge in the relation of the transformation of divers of these little animals which I observed because I have not found that any author has observed the like and because the thing itself is so strange and heterogenous from the usual progress of other animals that I judge it may not only be pleasant but very useful and necessary towards the completing of natural history there is indeed in Piso a very odd history which this relation may make the more probable and that is in the second chapter of the fourth book of his natural history of Brazil where he says later Cascopeides Longitudinous Breviorovus Radikibus Lapidaeus Nytensvadas Erupidus Infixa Erigiturke in Corpus Spangiosum Moleoblongum Rotundum Turbinatum Intismiris Cankelus Elves Fabricatum Ecstasatum Tenaci Glutin Instaurapum Propolis Ostiosatis Patulo Iprefundo in Sumetate Relicto Sicutex Altera Iconum Probe Depecta Videri Leakit See the third and fourth figures of the 27th Scheme Itaute Apiarium Marinum Veridixorus Primoenum Intuitu at Mariatterum Delaudum Vermiculus Catibot Carulius Parvus Chimaxa Calare Solis in Muscus Valerius Potius Esk Exigius Enigris Transforma Bontur Circumvolontesc Evinesevant Itaute Deiora Mellificatione Nihilserti Conspecidatum Fuerit Cumtamun Kerosa Materia Propolis Apumque Selai Manifeste Apererant Atcheipsa Mellis Qualis Cunque Substantia Procaldubio Orinatoribus Potibit Ubi Curiosius Inquisivirant Hague Apiaria Iache in Natale Solo Esalo diversis temporibus Penetius Lestrarant Which history contains things sufficiently strange to be considered. As whether the husk were a plant growing at the bottom of the sea before of itself, out of huge used putrefaction might be generated these strange kinds of baguettes. Or whether the seed of certain bees sinking to the bottom might there naturally form itself that vegetable hive and take root. Or whether it might not be placed there by some diving fly. Or whether it might not be some peculiar propriety of that plant whereby it might ripen or form its vegetable juice into an animal substance. Or whether it may not be of the nature of a sponge, or rather a sponge of the nature of this according to some of those relations and conjectures I formerly made of that body is a matter very difficult to be determined. But indeed in this description the excellent piezo has not been sufficiently particular in setting down the whole process as it were to be wished. There are indeed very odd progresses in the production of several kinds of insects which are not less instructive than pleasant, several of which the diligent Godartius has not carefully observed and recorded but among all his observations he has none like this. Though of the hemorobius be somewhat of this kind which is added as an appendix by Johannes May. I have for my own particular, besides several of those mentioned by him, observed divers other circumstances perhaps not much taken notice of, though very common, which do indeed afford us a very coercive argument to admire the goodness and providence of the infinitely wise creator in his most excellent contrivances and dispensations. I have observed it several times of the summer that many of the leaves of divers plants have been spotted or as it were scabbed, and looking on the undersides of those of them that have been but a little irregular I have perceived them to be sprinkled with divers sorts of little eggs which, letting alone, I have found by degrees to grow bigger and become little worms with legs to keep their former places and those places of the leaves of their own accords to be grown very protuberant upwards and very hollow, and arched underneath whereby these young creatures are as it were sheltered and housed from external injury. Divers leaves I have observed to grow and swell so far as it length perfectly to enclose the animal which by other observations I have made I guess to contain it and become, as it were a womb to it. So long till it be fit and prepared to be translated into another state at what time like what they say of vipers they gnaw their way through the womb that bred them. Divers of these kinds I have met with upon gooseberry leaves rose tree leaves, willow leaves and many other kinds. There are often to be found upon rose trees in briar bushes little red tufts which are certain knobs or excrescencies growing out from the rind or barks of those kind of plants. They are covered with strange kinds of threads or red hairs which feel very soft and look not unpleasantly. In most of these, if it has no hole in it you shall find certain little worms which I suppose to be the causes of their production. For when that worm has eaten its way through they having performed what they were designed by nature to do, by degrees die and wither away. Now the manner of their production I suppose to be thus that the all wise creator has well implanted in every creature a faculty of knowing what place is convenient for the hatching, nutrition and preservation of their eggs and of springs whereby they are stimulated and directed to convenient places which become, is to our the wombs that perform these offices. As he is also suited and adapted a property to those places whereby they grow and enclose those seeds and having enclosed them provide a convenient nourishment for them but as soon as they have done the office of a womb they die and wither. The progress of enclosure I have often observed in leaves which in those places where those seeds have been cast have by degrees swelled and enclosed them so perfectly round as not to leave any perceptible passage out. From this same cause I suppose the galls, oak apples and several other productions of that kind upon the branches and leaves of trees have their original for if you open any of them when almost ripe you shall find a little worm in them thus if you open never so many dry galls you shall find either a hole whereby the worm has eat its passage out or if you find no passage you may by breaking or cutting the gall find in the middle of it a small cavity and in it a small body which does plainly enough yet retain a shape to manifest it once to have been a worm. Though it died by a too early reparation from the oak on which it grew its navel string is toward being broken off from the leaf or branch by which the globular body that enveloped it received its nourishment from the oak. And indeed if we consider the great care of the creator in the dispensations of his providences for the propagation and increase of the race not only of all kind of animals but even of vegetables we cannot choose but admire and adore him to his excellencies. But we shall leave off to admire the creature to wonder at the strange kind of acting in several animals which seem to favor so much of reason. It seeming to me most manifest that those are but actings according to their structures and such operations as such bodies so composed must necessarily when there are such and such circumstances concurring perform. Thus when we find flies swarming about any piece of flesh that does begin from it, butterflies about call warts and several other leaves which will serve to hatch and nourish their young, gnats and several other flies about the waters and marshy places, or any other creature seeking and placing their seeds and convenient repositories we may if we attentively consider and examine it find that there are circumstances sufficient upon the supposals of the excellent contrivance of their machine to excite and force them to act after such a manner. Those steams that rise from these several places may perhaps set several parts of these little animals at work, even as in the contrivance of killing a fox or wolf with a gun the moving of a string is the death of the animal for the beast, by moving the flesh that is laid to entrap him pulls the string which moves the trigger and lets go the cock which on the steel strikes certain sparks of fire which kindle the powder in the pan and that presently flies into the barrel where the powder catching fire rarifies and drives out the bullet which kills the animal in all which actions there is nothing of intention or rationation to be ascribed either to the animal or engine but all to the ingeniousness of the contriver but to return to the more immediate consideration of our nat we have in it an instance not usual or common of a very strange amphibious creature that being a creature that inhabits the air does yet produce a creature that for some time lives in the water as a fish though afterward which is as strange it becomes an inhabitant of the air like its sire in the form of a fly and this me thinks does prompt me to propose certain conjectures as queries having not yet had sufficient opportunity and leisure to answer them myself from my own experiments or observations and the first is whether all those things that we suppose to be bred from corruption and putrefaction may not be rationally supposed to have their origination as natural as these gnats whose very probable were first dropped into this water in the form of eggs those seeds or eggs must certainly be very small which so small 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 observed having not exceeded the part of the bulk they have afterwards come to and next I have observed some of those little ones which must have been generated after the water was enclosed in the bottle and therefore most probably from eggs whereas those creatures have been supposed to be bred of the corruption of the water they're being not formally known any probable way how they should be generated a second is whether these eggs are immediately dropped into the water by the gnats themselves or immediately are brought down into the following rain for it seems not very improbable but that those small seeds of gnats may being perhaps of so light a nature and having so greater proportion of surface to so small a bulk of body be ejected into the air and so perhaps carried for a good while to and fro in it till by the drops of rain it be washed out of it a third is whether multitudes of 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 post script a good while since the writing of this description I was presented by Dr. Peter Ball an ingenious member of the Royal Society with a little paper of gnats which he told me was sent him from a brother of his out in the country from Mamhead in Devonshire some of them were loose having been suppose broken off others were still growing fast upon the sides of a stick which seemed by the bark pliableness of it and by certain strings that grew out of it to be some piece of the root of a tree they were all of them dried and a little shriveled others more round of a brown color their shape was much like a fig but very much smaller some being about the bigness of a bayberry others in the biggest of a hazelnut some of these that had no hole in them I carefully opened with my knife and found in them a good large round white maggot almost as big as a small pea which seemed shaped like other maggots but shorter I could not find them to move though I guessed them to be alive because upon pricking them with a pin there would issue out a great deal of white mucus matter which seemed to be from a voluntary contraction of their skin their Husker matrix consisted of three coats like the barks of trees the outermost being more rough and spongy and the thickest the middlemost more close, hard, white and thin the innermost very thin seeming almost like the skin within an eggshell the two outermost had root in the branch or stick but the innermost had no stem or process but was only a skin that covered the cavity of the nut all the nuts that had no holes eaten in them I found to contain these maggots but all that had holes I found the maggots it seems having eaten their way through taken wings and flown away as this following account which I received in writing from the same person as it was sent him by his brother manifests in a Moorish black peaty mold with some small veins of whiteish yellow sands upon occasion of digging a hole two or three foot deep at the head of a pond or pool to set a tree in at that depth were found about the end of 1863 in those very veins of sand those buttons or nuts sticking to a little loose stick that is not belonging to any live tree and some of them also free by themselves for a five of which being then open some were found to contain live insects come to perfection most like to flying ants if not the same in others insects yet imperfect having but the head and wings formed the rest remaining a soft white pulpy substance now as this furnishes us with one odd history more very agreeable to what I before hinted so I doubt not but were men diligent observers they might meet with multitudes of the same kind both in the earth and in the water and in the air on trees plants and other vegetables all places and things being as it were and a marim plana and I have often with wonder and measure in the spring and summertime looked close to indiligently on common garden mold and in a very small parcel of it found such multitudes and diversities of little reptiles some in husks others only creepers many winged and ready for the air divers husks or habitations left behind empty now if the earth of our cold climate be so fertile of animate bodies what may we think of the fat earth of hotter climates none may there by its activity causes great a parcel of earth to fly on wings in the air as it does of water in steams and vapors and what swarms must we suppose to be sent out of those plentiful inundations of water which are poured down by the sleuces of rain in such vast quantities so that we need not much wonder at those innumerable clouds of locusts with which Africa and other hot countries are so pestered since in those places are found all the convenient causes for production namely genitors or parents concurrent receptacles or matrixes and a sufficient degree of natural heat and moisture I was going to annex a little draft of the figure of those nuts sent out of Devonshire but chanceing to examine Mr. Parkinson's herbal for something else and particularly about gulls and oak apples I found among no less than 24 several kinds of excrescences of the oak which I doubt not but upon examination will all be found to be the matrixes of so many several kinds of insects I having observed many of them myself to be so among 24 several kinds I say I found one described and figured directly like that which I had by me the scheme is there to be seen the description, because but short I have here adjoined Teatry Botanarchy TRIB XVI CHAPTER II There groweth at the roots of old oaks in the springtime and sometimes also in the very heat of summer, a peculiar kind of mushroom or excrescence called uvacircina swelling out of the earth, many growing one close unto another of the fashion of a grape and therefore took the name the oak grape and is of a purplish color on the outside and white within like milk and in the end of summer becomeeth hard and woody whether this be the very same kind I cannot affirm but both the picture and description come very near to that I have but that he seems not to take notice of the hollowness or worm for which tis most observable and therefore tis very likely if men did but take notice they might find very many differing species of these nuts, ovaries or matrixes and all of them too have much the same designation in office and I have very lately found several excrescences on trees and shrubs which having endured the winter upon opening them I found most of them to contain little worms but dead, those things that contain them being withered and dry End of section 48 Recording by Philip Gould Section 49 of micrographia This is a LibriVox recording A LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Dion Giants Salt Lake City, Utah Micrographia by Robert Hook Section 49 Observation 44 of the tufted or brush-horned Nat This little creature was one of those multitudes that fill our English air all the time that warm weather lasts exactly of the shape of that I observed to be generated and hatched out of those little insects that wriggle up and down in rainwater but though many were of this form yet I observed others to be of quite other kinds nor were all of this or the other kind generated out of water insects for whereas I observed that those that proceeded from those insects were at their full growth I have also found multitudes of the same shape but much smaller and tenderer seeming to be very young ones creep up and down upon the leaves of trees and flying up and down in small clusters in places very remote from water and this spring I observed one day when the wind was very calm and the afternoon very fair and pretty warm though it had for a long time been very cold weather and the wind continued still in the east several small swarms of them playing to and fro in little clouds in the sun each of which were not a tenth part of the bigness of one of these I here have delineated though very much of the same shape which makes me notice that each of these swarms might be the offspring of one only nat which had been hoarded up in some safe repository all this winter by some provident parent and were now by the warmth of this spring air hatched into little flies and indeed so various and seemingly irregular are the generations or productions of insects but he that shall carefully and diligently observe the several methods of nature therein will have infinitely cause further to admire the wisdom and providence of the creator for not only the same kind of creature may be produced from several kinds of ways but the very same creature may produce several kinds for as diverse watches may be made as several materials which may yet have all the same appearance and move after the same manner that is show the hour equally true the one as the other and out of the same kind of matter like watches may be differing ways and as one and the same watch may by being diversely agitated or moved by this or that agent or after this or that manner produce a contrary effect so may it be with these most curious engines of insects bodies the all wise God of nature may have so ordered and disposed the little automatons that when nourished, acted or enlivened by this cause they produce one kind of effect or animate shape when by another they act quite another way and another animal is produced so may he so order several materials as to make them by several kinds of methods produce similar automatons but to come to the description of this insect as it appears through a microscope of which a representation is made in the 28th scheme its head a is exceeding small in proportion to its body consisting of two clusters of purled eyes BB on each side of its head whose pearls or eyeballs are curiously ranged like those of other flies between these in the forehead of it there are placed upon two small black balls CC two long jointed horns tapering towards the top much resembling the long horns of lobsters each of whose stems matched with multitudes of small stiff hairs issuing out every way from the several joints like the strings or sproutings of the herb horsetail which is often observed to grow among corn and for the whole shape it does very much resemble those brushy vegetables besides these there are two other jointed and bristled horns or feelers E.E. which in some gnats are very long straight hollow pipes by which these creatures are able to drill and penetrate the skin and thence through those pipes suck so much blood as to stuff their bellies so full till they be ready to burst this small head with its appurtenances is fastened on by a short neck G to the middle of the thorax which is large and seems cased with a strong black shell H.I.K out of the under part of which issue six long and slender legs L.L.L. L.L.L shaped just like the legs of flies but spun or drawn out longer and slenderer which could not be expressed in the figure because of their great length and from the upper part to oblong but slender transparent wings M.M. shaped somewhat like those of a fly underneath each of which as I have observed also in diverse sorts of flies and other kinds of gnats was placed a small body and much resembling a drop of some transparent glutinous substance hardened or cooled as it was almost ready to fall for it has a round knob at the end by degrees grows slenderer into a small stem and near the insertion under the wing this stem again grows bigger these little pendulums I may so call them the little creature vibrates to and fro very quick when it moves its wings and I have sometimes observed it to move them also whilst the wing lay still but also their motions seem to further the motion ready to follow of what use they are as to the moving of the wing or otherwise I have not now time to examine its belly was large as it is usually in all insects and extended into nine lengths or partitions each of which was covered with round armed rings or shells six of which OPQRST were transparent and diverse kinds or astaltic motions might be very easily perceived whilst the animal was alive but especially a small clear white part V seemed to be like the heart of a larger animal the last three divisios W, X, Y were covered with black and opatious shells to conclude take this creature altogether and for beauty and curious contrivances with the largest animal upon the earth nor doth the all wise creator seem to have shown less care and providence in the fabric of it than in those which seem most considerable end of section 49 section 50 of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording a LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Dion Giants Salt Lake City, Utah micrographia by Robert Hoot observation 45 of the great bellied nat or female nat the second nat delineated in the 29th scheme is of a very differing shape from the former but yet of this sort also I found several of the nats that were generated out of a better insect the wings of this were much larger than those of the other and the belly much bigger shorter and of an other shape and from several particulars I guessed it to be the female nat and the former to be the male the thorax of this was much like that of the other having a very strong and ridged back piece which went also on either side of its legs there were several jointed pieces of armor which seemed curiously and conveniently contrived for the promoting and strengthening the motion of the wings its head was much differing from the other being much bigger and neater shaped and the horns that grew out between his eyes on two little balls were of a very differing shape from the tufts of the other nat these having but a few knots or joints and each of those but a few and those short and strong bristles the foremost horns or feelers were like those of the former nat one of these nats I have suffered to pierce the skin of my hand with its proboscis and fence to draw out as much blood as to fill its belly as full as it could hold making it appear very red and transparent and this without any further pain than whilst it was sinking in its proboscis as it is also in the stinging of fleas a good argument that these creatures do not wound the skin and suck the blood out of enmity and revenge but for mere necessity and to satisfy their hunger by what means this creature is able to suck we shall show in another place end of section 50 section 51 of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording a LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Dion Johns Salt Lake City, Utah micrographia by Robert Hook section 51 observation 46 of the white feather winged moth or tinia this white long winged moth which is delineated in the 30 scheme afforded a lovely object both to the naked eye and through a microscope to the eye it appeared a small milk white fly with four white wings the two foremost somewhat longer than the two hindermost and the two shorter about half an inch long each of which four wings seemed to consist of two small long feathers very curiously tufted or haired on each side with purely white and exceedingly fine and small hairs proportioned to the stalks or stems out of which they grew much like the tufts of a long wing feather of some bird and their stalks or stems were like those banded backwards and downwards as may be plainly seen by the draughts of them in the figure observing one of these in my microscope I found in the first place that all the body, legs, horns and the stalks of the wings were covered over with various kinds of curious white feathers which did with handling or touching easily rub off and fly about in so much that looking on my fingers with which I had handled this moth and perceiving on them little white specks I found by my microscope that they were several of the small feathers of this little creature that stuck up and down in the rugosities of my skin next I found that underneath these feathers the pretty insect was covered all over with a crusted shell like other of those animals but with one much thinner and tenderer thirdly I found as in I had differing and appropriate kinds of feathers that covered several parts of its body fourthly surveying the parts of its body with a more accurate and better magnifying microscope I found that the tufts or hairs of its wings were nothing else but a conjuries or a thick set cluster of small vimina or twigs resembling a small twig of birch, stripped or whitened with which are usually made to beat out or brush off the dust from cloth and hangings every one of the twigs or branches that composed the brush of the feathers appeared in this bigger magnifying glass of which EF represents one twenty fourth part of an inch is the scale as G is of the lesser which is only one third like the figure D the feathers also that covered a part of his body and were interspersed among the brush of his wings I found in the bigger magnifying glass of the shape A consisting of a stock or stem in the middle and a seeming tuftedness or a brushy part on each side the feathers that covered most part of his body and the stock of his wings were in the same microscope much of the figure B appearing in the shape of a small feather and seemed tufted those which covered the horns and small parts of the legs through the same microscope appeared of the shape C whether the tufts of any or all of these small feathers consisted of such component particles as the feathers of birds I much doubt because I find that nature does not always keep or operate after the same method in smaller and bigger creatures and of this we have particular instances in the wings of several creatures for whereas in birds of all kinds it composes each of the feathers of which its wing consists of such an exceeding curious and most admirable and stupendious texture as I elsewhere show in the observations on a feather we find it to alter its method quite in the fabric of the wings of these minute creatures composing some of thin extended membranes or skins such as the wings of dragonflies in others those skins are all overgrown and pretty thick be stuck with short bristles as in flesh flies in others those films are covered both on the upper and underside with small feathers placed almost like the tiles on a house and are curiously ranged with most lively colors as is observable in butterflies and several kinds of mods in others instead of their films nature has provided nothing but a matter of half a score stocks if I well remember the number for I have not lately met with any of these flies and did not when I first observed them take sufficient notice of diverse particulars and each of these stocks with a few single branchings on each side resembling much the branched backbone of a herring or the like fish or a thin haired peacocks feather the top or the eye being broken off with a few of these on either side which it was able to shut up or expand a pleasure much like a fan or rather like the posture of the feathers in a wing which lay even under another when shut and by the side of each other when expanded this pretty little gray moth for such was the creature I observed thus winged could vary nimbly and as it seemed very easily move its corpuscle through the air from place to place other insects have their wings cased or covered over with certain hollow shells shaped almost like those hollow hairy meat whose hollow sides being turned downwards do not only secure their folded wings from injury of the earth in which most of those creatures reside but whilst they fly serves as a help to sustain and bear them up and these are observable in scarabies and a multitude of other terrestrial crustaceous insects in which we may yet further observe a particular providence of nature now in all these kinds of wings we observe this particular as a thing most worthy remark that wherever a wing consists of discontinued parts the pores or interstitia between those parts are very seldom either much bigger or much smaller than these which we here find between the particles of these brushes so that it should seem to indicate that the parts of the air are such that they will not easily or readily if at all pass through these pores so that they seem to be strainers fine enough to hinder the particles of the air whether hindered by their bulk or by their agitation circulation, rotation or undulation I shall not here determine from getting through them and by that means serve as well if not better than if they were little films I say if not better because I have observed that all those creatures that have filmed wings move them aboundingly quicker and more strongly such as all kind of flies and scarabies and bats than such as have their wings covered with feathers as butterflies and birds or twigs as moths which have each of them such slower motion of their wings that little ruggedness perhaps of their wings helping them somewhat by taking better hold of the parts of the air or not suffering them so easily to pass by any other way than one but whatever be the reason of it tis most evident that the smooth winged insects have the strongest muscles or movement parts of their wings and the other much weaker and this very insect we are now describing had a very small thorax or middle part of its body if compared to the length and number of its wings which therefore as he moved them very slowly so must he move them very weakly and this last property do we find somewhat observed also in bigger kind of flying creatures birds so that we see that the wisdom and providence of the all wise creator is not less shown in these small despicable creatures flies and moths which we have branded with a name of ignominy calling them vermin then in those greater and more remarkable animate bodies birds I cannot here stand to add anything about the nature of flying though perhaps on another occasion I may say something on that subject it being such as may deserve a much more accurate examination and scrutiny than it has hitherto met with for it to me there seems nothing wanting to make a man able to fly but what may be easily enough supplied from the mechanics hitherto known save only the want of strength which the muscles of a man seem utterly incapable of by reason of their smallness and texture but how even strength also may be mechanically made and an artificial muscle so contrived that thereby a man shall be able to exert what strength he pleases and to regulate it also to his own mind I may elsewhere endeavor to manifest section 51 section 52 of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Sonya micrographia by Robert Hook section 52 observation 47 of the shepherd spider or long-legged spider the carter, shepherd spider or long-legged spider has for two particularities very few similar creatures that I have met with the first which is discoverable only by the microscope and is in the first and second figures of the 31st scheme plainly described is the curious contrivance of his eyes of which, differing from most other spiders he has only two based upon the top of a small pillar or hillock rising out of the middle of the top of its back or rather the crown of its head for they were fixed on the very top of this pillar which is about the height of one of the transverse diameters of the eye and looked on in another posture appeared much of the shape B.C.D the two eyes B.B. were placed back to back with the transparent parts or the pupils either side but somewhat more forward than backwards C. was the column on neck on which they stood and D. the crown of the head out of which that neck sprung these eyes to appearance seem to be of the very same structure with that of larger binocular creatures seeming to have a very smooth and very protuberant cornea and in the midst of it to have a very black pupil out with the kind of grey iris as appears by the figure whether it were able to move these eyes to and fro I have not observed but this not very likely he should the pillar or neck C seeming to be covered and stiffened with a crusty shell but nature in probability has supplied that defect by making the cornea so very protuberant and setting it so clear above the shadowing yet by the body that this likely each eye may perceive though not see distinctly almost a hemisphere when having so small and round the body placed upon such long legs it is quickly able so to wind and turn it as to see anything distinct this creature, as do all other spiders I have yet examined does very much differ from most other insects in the figure of its eyes my best microscope discover its eyes to be any ways knobbed or purled like those of other insects the second peculiarity which is obvious to the eye is also very remarkable and that is the prodigious length of its legs in proportion to its small round body each leg of this I drew being above 16 times the length of its whole body and there are some which have them yet longer and others that seem of the same kind that have them a great deal shorter the eight legs are each of them jointed just like those of a crab but every of the parts are spun out prodigiously longer in proportion each of these legs are terminated in a small case or shell shaped almost like that of a muscle shell as is evident in the third figure of the same scheme that represents the appearance of the under part or belly of the creature by the shape of the protuberant the eye, eye, eye, eye etc these are as were placed or fastened on to the protuberant body of the insect which is to be supposed very high at M making a kind of blunt cone where of M is to be supposed the apex about which greater cone of the body the smaller cones of the legs are placed each of them almost reaching to the top in so admirable a manner as does not a little manifest the wisdom of nature in the contrivance for these long levers as I may so call them of the legs having not the advantage of a long end on the other side of the hypomocleon or centres on which the parts of the legs move must necessarily require a vast strength to move them and keep the body balanced and suspended in so much that if we should suppose a man's body suspended by such a contrivance a hundred and fifty times the strength of a man would not keep the body from falling on the breast to supply therefore each of these legs with its proper strength nature has allowed to each a large chest or cell in which is included a very large and strong muscle and thereby this little animal is not only able to suspend its body upon less than these eight but to move it very swiftly over the tops of grass and leaves nor are these eight legs so prodigiously long but the ninth and tenth which are the two claws KK are as short and serving steed of a proboscis for those seem very little longer than his mouth each of them had three parts but very short the joints KK which represented the third being longer than both the other this creature seems which I have several times with pleasure observed to throw its body upon the prey instead of its hands not unlike a hunting spider which leaps like a cat at a mouse the whole fabric was a very pretty one and could I have dissected it I doubt not but I should have found as many singularities within it as without perhaps for the most part not unlike the parts of a crab which this little creature does in many things very much resemble the curiosity of whose contrivance I have in another place examined I omit the description of the horns AA of the mouth LL which seemed like that of a crab the speckledness of his shell which proceeded from a kind of feathers or hairs and the hairiness of his legs his large thorax and little belly and the like they being manifested by the figure and shall only take notice that the three parts of the body namely the head breast and belly are in this creature strangely confused so that this is difficult to determine which is which as they are also in a crab and indeed this seems to be nothing else but an air crab being made more light and nimble proportionable to the medium wherein it resides and as air seems to have but one thousandth part of the body of water so does this spider seem not to be a thousandth part of the bulk of a crab End of section 52 section 53 of micrographia this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Phil Shampf micrographia by Robert Hook observation 48 of the hunting spider and several other sorts of spiders the hunting spider is a small grey spider prettily bespect with black spots all over its body which the microscope discovers to be a kind of feathers like those on butterflies wings or the body of the white moth I lately described its gait is very nimble by fits sometimes running and sometimes leaping like a grasshopper almost then standing still and setting itself on its hinder legs it will very nimbly turn its body and look around itself every way it has six very conspicuous eyes two looking directly forwards placed just before two other on either side of those looking forward and sideways and two other about the middle of the top of its back or head which look backwards and sidewards these seem to be the biggest the surface of them all was very black spherical purely polished very clear and distinct image of all the ambient objects such as a window, a man's hand a white paper or the like some other properties of this spider observed by the most accomplished Mr. Evelyn in his travels in Italy are most emphatically set forth in the history here unto annexed which he was pleased upon my desire to send me in writing of all the sorts of insects there is none has afforded me more divertisements than the Venatoris which are a sort of lupae that have their dens in the rugged walls and crevices of our houses a small brown and delicately spotted kind of spiders whose hindered legs are longer than the rest such I did frequently observe at Rome which a spying of fly at three or four yards distance upon the balcony where I stood would not make directly to her but crawl under the rail and arrive to the antipodes it would steal up seldom missing its aim but if a chance to want anything of being perfectly opposite would at first peep immediately slide down again till taking better notice it would come the next time exactly upon the fly's back but if this happened not to be within a competent leap then would this insect move so softly as the very shadow of the nomen seem not to be more imperceptible unless the fly moved and then would the spider move also in the same proportion keeping that just time with her motion as if the same soul had animated both those little bodies and whether it were forwards backwards or to either side without at all turning her body like a well managed horse but if the capricious fly took wing and pitched upon another place behind our huntress then would the spider whirl its body out as nothing could be imagined more swift by which means she always kept the head towards her prey though to appearance as immovable as if it had been a nail driven into the wood till by that indiscernible progress being arrived within the sphere of her reach she made a fatal leap swift as lightning upon the fly catching him in the pole where she never quitted hold till her belly was full and then carried the remainder home and held them instructing their young ones how to hunt which they would sometimes discipline for not well observing but when any of the old ones did as sometimes miss a leap they would run out of the field and hide them in their crannies as ashamed and happily not be seen abroad for four or five hours after for so long have I watched the nature of this strange insect the contemplation of whose so wonderful sagacity and address has amazed me nor do I find in any chase whatsoever more cunning and stratagem observed I have found some of these spiders in my garden when the weather towards the spring is very hot but they are nothing so eager of hunting as they are in Italy there are multitudes of other sorts of spiders whose eyes and most other parts and properties are so exceedingly different both from those I have described and from one another that it would be almost endless at least too long for my present essay to describe them as some with six eyes placed in quite another order others with eight eyes others with fewer and some with more they all seem to be creatures of prey and to feed on other small insects but their ways of catching them seem very differing the shepherd spider by running on his prey the hunting spider by leaping on it other sorts weave nets or cobwebs whereby they ensnare them nature having both fitted them with materials and tools and taught them how to work and weave their nets and to lie per do and to watch diligently to run on any fly as soon as ever entangled their thread or web seems to be spun out of some viscous kind of excrement lying in their belly which though soft when drawn out is presently by reason of its smallness hardened and dried by the radiant air examining several of which with my microscope I found them to appear much like white horsehair or some such a transparent horny substance and to be a very differing magnitudes some appearing as big as a pig's bristle others equal to a horsehair other no bigger than a man's air others yet smaller and finer I observed further that the radiating cords of the web were much bigger and smoother than those that were woven round which seemed smaller and all over knotted or purled with small transparent globules not unlike small crystal beads or seed pearls thin strung on a clue of silk which whether they were so spun by the spider or by the adventitious moisture of a fog which I have observed to cover all these filaments with such crystalline beads I will not now dispute these threads were some of them so small that I could very plainly with the microscope discover the same consecutions of colors as in a prism and they seem to proceed from the same cause with those colors which I have already described in thin plated bodies much resembling a cobweb or a confused lock of these cylinders is a certain white substance which after a fog may be observed to fly up and down the air catching several of these and examining them with my microscope found them to be much of the same form looking most like to a flake of worsted prepared to be spun though by what means they should be generated or produced is not easily imagined they were of the same weight or very little heavier than the air and is not unlikely but that those great white clouds that appear all the summertime may be of the same substance. End of section 53