Volume 2

The select works, containing his microscopical discoveries / translated from the Dutch and Latin editions by Samuel Hoole.

  • Leeuwenhoek, Antoni van, 1632-1723.
Date:
1798-1807
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The select works, containing his microscopical discoveries / translated from the Dutch and Latin editions by Samuel Hoole. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    46/384 (page 38)
    of feveral worms or maggots, that I had two which acquired their compleat portions of nourithment, and began to fpin their webs; but, becaufe the bottom of the glafs wdierein they lay was flopped with a fmooth piece of cork, and that prefled in fo tight that they could not penetrate it, they could not completely coyer themfelves with the web. For in like manner as filk worms are placed in a paper of a round tapering form, called a cup, in order that it may fix its web on every fide, and be completely covered by it; fo the worm produced from the Flea’s egg, when come to its full fize, endea- vours to creep into cracks, holes, or corners, in order to inclofe it- felf on every fide with its web. At feveral times I contrived to prevent the maggots enclofing themfelves completely in their webs, in order that I might the more eafily difcern their alteration into a chryfalis or aurelia. But how often foever I viewed them after they had ceafed eating, and their change approached, I could only perceive that they placed them- felves in the fame pofition as they had lain in the egg. But exa- mining them in the afternoon in .this pofture, I found upon look- ing at them three hours afterwards, that one of them was changed into a chryfalis. Upon viewing another of them through the mi- crofcope, I perceived a mite upon its body, where it remained fome time, and another larger mite running about the glafs, whereupon I concluded, that at the time thofe worms are in their ftate of change and unable to defend themfelves, the mites will feize and feed upon them. After this worm had thus laid for fome hours, I faw that its body was somewhat contradled, whereupon placing it before the microfcope, I perceived three holes pierced in its body, part of its tkin ftripped off, and the body of it beginning to dry away. Flereupon I began to confider, that this web or covering fpun by the Flea’s worm or maggot is necessary to it, and that without it, thofe creatures could not eafily be propagated; for there are fel- dom any fragments of food, or the bodies of lmall animals lying