Part 14
It is recorded by Oviedo and Herrera, that the whole island of Hispaniola was almost abandoned in consequence of the Sugar-Ant, _Formica omnivora_ of Linnæus, which, in 1518 and the two succeeding years, overran in such countless myriads that island, devouring all vegetation, and causing a famine which nearly depopulated the Spanish colony. A tradition, says Schomburgk, prevails in Jamaica that the town of Sevilla Nueva, which was founded by Esquivel in the beginning of the sixteenth century, was entirely deserted for a similar reason. Herrera relates that, in order to get rid of this fearful scourge in Hispaniola, the priests caused great processions and vows to be made in honor of their patron saint, St. Saturnin, and that the day of this saint was celebrated with great solemnities, and the Ants in consequence began to disappear. How this saint was chosen, we read in Purchas’s Pilgrims: “This miserie (caused by the Ants) so perplexed the _Spaniards_, that they sought as strange a remedie as was the disease, which was to chuse some Saint for their Patron against the Antes. _Alexander Giraldine_, the Bishop, having sung a solemne and Pontifical Masse, after the consecration and Eleuation of the Sacrament, and devout prayers made by him and the people, opened a Booke in which was a Catalogue of the Saints, by lot to chuse some he or she Saint, whom God should please to appoint their Advocate against the Calamitie. And the Lot fell vpon Saint _Saturnine_, whose Feast is on the nine and twentieth of Nouember; after which the Ant damage became more tolerable, and by little and little diminished, by God’s mercie and intercession of that Saint.”[578]
These devouring Ants showed themselves about the year 1760 in Barbados, and caused such devastations that, in the words of Dr. Coke, “it was deliberated whether that island, formerly so flourishing, should not be deserted.” In 1763, Martinique was visited by these devastating hordes; and about the year 1770 they made their appearance in the island of Granada. Barbados, Granada, and Martinique suffered more than any other islands from this plague. Granada especially was reduced to a state of the most deplorable desolation; for, it is said, their numbers there were so immense that they covered the roads for many miles together; and so crowded were they in many places that the impressions made by the feet of horses, which traveled over them, would remain visible but for a moment or two, for they were almost instantly filled up by the surrounding swarms. Mr. Schomburgk assures us that calves, pigs, and chickens, when in a helpless state, were attacked by such large numbers of these Ants that they perished, and were soon reduced to skeletons when not timely assisted. It is asserted by Dr. Coke that the greatest precaution was requisite to prevent their attacks on men who were afflicted with sores, on women who were confined, and on children that were unable to assist themselves. Mr. Castle, from his own observation, states that even burning coals laid in their way, were extinguished by the amazing numbers which rushed upon them.
Notwithstanding the myriads that were destroyed by fire, water, poison, and other means, the devastations continued to such an alarming extent, that in 1776 the government of Martinique offered a reward of a million of their currency for a remedy against this plague; and the legislature of Granada offered £20,000 for the same object; but all attempts proved ineffectual until the hurricane in 1780 effected what human power had been unable to accomplish.
In 1814, the Ants again made their appearance in the island of Barbados, doing considerable injury; but happily they did not continue long.[579]
Malouet, in visiting the forests of Guiana, of which he has spoken in his travels into that part of the globe, perceived in the midst of a level savanna, as far as the eye could reach, a hillock which he would have attributed to the hand of man, if M. de Prefontaine, who accompanied him, had not informed him that, in spite of its gigantic construction, it was the work of black Ants of the largest species (most probably of the genus _Ponera_). He proposed to conduct him, not to the Ant-hill, where both of them would infallibly have been devoured, but to the road of the workers. M. Malouet did not approach within more than forty paces of the habitation of these insects. It had the form of a pyramid truncated at one-third of its height, and he estimated that its elevation might be about fifteen or twenty feet, on a basis of from thirty to forty. M. de Prefontaine told him that the cultivators were obliged to abandon a new establishment, when they had the misfortune to meet with one of these fortresses, unless they had sufficient strength to form a regular siege. This even occurred to M. de Prefontaine himself on his first encampment at Kourva. He was desirous of forming a second a little farther on, and perceived upon the soil a mound of earth similar to that which we have just described. He caused a circular trench to be hollowed, which he filled with a great quantity of dry wood, and, after having set fire to it in every point of its circumference, he attacked the Ant-hill with a train of artillery. Thus every issue was closed to the hostile army, which, to escape from the invasion of the flames and the shaking and plowing of the ground by the cannon-balls, was obliged to traverse, in its retreat, a trench filled with fire, where it was entirely cut off.[580]
The Portuguese found such prodigious numbers of Ants upon their first landing at Brazil, that they called them Rey de Brazil, King of Brazil, a name which they now there bear.[581]
Mr. Southey states, on the authority of Manoel Felix, that the Red-ants devoured the cloths of the altar in the Convent of S. Antonio, or S. Luiz (Maranham, Brazil), and also brought up into the church pieces of shrouds from the graves; whereupon the friars prosecuted them according to due form of ecclesiastical law. What the sentence was in this case, we are unable to learn. A similar case, however, the historian informs us, had occurred in the Franciscan Convent at Avignon, where the Ants did so much mischief that a suit was instituted against them, and they were excommunicated, and ordered by the friars, in pursuance of their sentence, to remove within three days to a place assigned them in the center of the earth. The Canonical account gravely adds, that the Ants obeyed, and carried away all their young, and all their stores.[582]
Annius writes, that an ancient city situate near the Volscian Lake, and called Contenebra, was in times past overthrown by Ants, and that the place was thereupon commonly called to his day, “the camp of the Ants.”[583]
Ctesias makes mention “of a horse-pismire (_i.e._ the bigger kind of them in hollow trees) which was fed by the Magi, till hee grew to such a vast bulke as to devour two pound of flesh a daye.”[584]
Martial has written the following beautiful epigram on an Ant inclosed in amber: “While an Ant was wandering under the shade of the tree of Phaeton, a drop of amber enveloped the tiny insect; thus she, who in life was disregarded, became precious by death.
“A drop of amber from the weeping plant, Fell unexpected and embalmed an Ant; The little insect we so much contemn Is, from a worthless Ant, become a gem.”[585]
It has been said, remarks Mr. Southey, and regarded as a vulgar error, that Ants cannot pass over a line of chalk: the fact, however, is certain. Mr. Coleridge tried the experiment at Malta, he continues, and immediately discovered the cause: The formic acid is so powerful, that it acts upon the chalk, and the legs of the insect are burnt by the instantaneous effervescence![586]
Paxamus says, that if you take some Ants and burn them, you will drive away the others, as experience has taught us. Ants also, he continues, will not touch a vessel with honey, although the vessel may happen to be without its cover, if you wrap it in white wool, or if you scatter white earth or ruddle round it. If a person, continues Paxamus, takes a grain of wheat carried by an Ant with the thumb of his left hand, and lays it in a skin of Phœnician dye, and ties it round the head of his wife, it will prove to be the cause of abortion in a state of gestation.[587]
Pliny says the proper remedy for the venom of the _Solipuga_ or _Solpuga_ Ant, and for that of all kinds of Ants, is a bat’s heart.[588]
Callicrates used to make Ants, and other such little creatures, out of ivory, with so much skill and ingenuity that other men could not discern the counterfeits from the originals even with the help of glasses.[589]
Vespidæ--Wasps, Hornets.
Concerning the generation of the Wasp, Topsel and Moufet have the following: “Isidore affirms that Wasps come out of the putrefied carkasses of asses, although he may be mistaken, for all agree that the Scarabees are procreated from them: rather am I of opinion with Pliny, 1. ii. c. 20, and the Greek authors, that they are sprung from the dead bodies of horses, for the horse is a valiant and warlike creature, hence is that verse frequently and commonly used among the Greeks:
Wasps come from horses, Bees from bulls are bred.
And indeed their more than ordinary swiftnesse and their eagernesse in fight, are sufficient arguments that they can take their original from no other creature (much less from an asse, hart, or oxe) since that Nature never granted to any creatures else, to excel both in swiftness and valour. And surely that I may give another sense of that proverb of Aristotle,
Hail the daughters of the wing-footed steed:
this would I suppose fit to be spoken in way of jest and scorn to scolding women, which do imitate the hastiness and froward disposition of the Wasp. Other sorts of them are produced out of the putrid corps of the Crocodiles, if Horus and the Ægyptians be to be believed, for which reason when they mean a Wasp, they set it forth by an horse or crocodile. Nicander gives them the name _lukosnoadon_, because they sometimes come from the dead carkasses of wolves. Bellenacensis and Vicentius say, that Wasps come out of the putrefaction of an old deer’s head, flying sometimes out of the eyes, sometimes out of the nostrils.... There are those also that affirm that Wasps are begotten of the earth and rottenness of some kind of fruits, as Albertus and the Arabick scholiast.”
Of the Hornet, likewise, these writers tell the following fabulous stories: “The Latins call the Hornets _Crabrones_, perchance from the village Crabra in the countrey of Tusculum (where there are great store of them), or from the word _Caballus_, _i.e._ a horse, who is said to be their father. According to that of Ovid, _Met._ 15:
The warlike horse if buried under ground, Shortly a brood of Hornets will be found.
Albertus calls it a yellow Bee. Cardanus will needs have them to arise from the dead mule. Plutarch, in the life of Cleomedes, saith they come out of horse flesh, as the Bees do out of the oxe his paunch. Virgil saith they are produced of the asse.... I conceive that those are produced of the harder flesh of the horse, and the Wasps of the more tender flesh.”[590]
The Hornet (but whether or not it was the common species, _Vespa crabro_, Linn., is uncertain), we learn from Scriptures was employed by Providence to drive out the impious inhabitants of Canaan, and subdue them under the hand of the Israelites.--“And I sent the Hornet before you, which drave them out before you, even the two kings of the Amorites.”[591]
In the second volume of Lieutenant Holman’s Travels, the following anecdote is related: “Eight miles from Grandie----, the muleteers suddenly called out ‘Marambundas! Marambundas!’ which indicated the approach of Wasps. In a moment all the animals, whether loaded or otherwise, lay down on their backs, kicking most violently; while the blacks, and all persons not already attacked, ran away in different directions, all being careful, by a wide sweep, to avoid the swarms of tormentors that came forward like a cloud. I never witnessed a panic so sudden and complete, and really believe that the bursting of a water-spout could hardly have produced more commotion. However, it must be confessed that the alarm was not without good reason, for so severe is the torture inflicted by these pigmy assailants, that the bravest travelers are not ashamed to fly, the instant they perceive the host approaching, which is of common occurrence on the Campos.”[592]
Dr. Fairfax, in the Philosophical Transactions, mentions a lady, who had such a horror of Wasps, that during the season in which they abound in houses, she always confined herself to her apartment.[593]
Dr. James tells us: “The combs (of the Hornet) are recommended in a drench for that disorder in horses, which Vigetius, L. 2, c. 23, calls scrofula, meaning, I believe, what we call the strangles.”[594]
Hornets’-nest is smoked under horses’ noses for distemper, cold in the head, and such like diseases. It is also given to horses in their feed for thick-windedness.
The nests of Hornets are gathered by the country people to clean spectacles.
Topsel, in his History of Four-footed Beasts and Serpents, has the following prognostications of the weather from the appearances of Hornets: “They serve instead of good almanacks to countrey people, to foretel tempests and change of weather, as hail, rain, and snow: for if they flie about in greater numbers, and be oftner seen about any place, then usually they are wont, it is a signe of heat and fair weather the next day. But if about twilight they are observed to enter often their nests, as though they would hide themselves, you must the next day expect rain, winde, or some stormy, troublesome or boysterous season: whereupon Avienus hath these verses:
So if the buzzing troups of Hornets hoarse to flie, In spacious air ’bout Autumn’s end you see, When Virgil star the evening lamp espie, Then from the sea some stormy tempest sure shall be.”[595]
“In the year 190, before the birth of Christ,” say Moufet and Topsel, “as Julius witnesseth, an infinite multitude of Wasps flew into the market at Capua, and sate in the temple of Mars, they were with great diligence taken and burnt solemnly, yet they did foreshew the coming of the enemy and the burning of the city.”[596]
The first Wasp seen in the season should always be killed. By so doing, you secure to yourself good luck and freedom from enemies throughout the year.[597] This is an English superstition, and it prevails in parts of America. We have one, also, directly opposed to it, namely, that the first Wasp seen in the season should not be killed if you wish to secure to yourself good luck. Many of our people, too, will kill a Wasp at no time, for, if killed, they say, it will bring upon them bad luck.
If a Wasp stings you, our superstitious think that your foes will get the advantage of you.
If the first Wasp seen in the season be seen in your house, it is a sign that you will form an unpleasant acquaintance. If the first Bee seen in the season be seen in your house, it is a sign you will form a pleasant and useful acquaintance. This arose doubtless from the apparent uselessness of the former, and worth of the latter insect.
Wasps building in a house foretell the coming to want of the family occupying it. Likewise arose from the unthriftiness of this insect.
If Hornets build high, the winter will be dry and mild; if low, cold and stormy. This is firmly believed in Virginia; and the idea seems to be, that if the nest is built high it will be more exposed to the wind than if built low.
That a person may not be stung by Wasps, Paxamus says: “Let the person be rubbed with the juice of wild-mallow, and he will not be stung.”[598]
The Creoles of Mauritius eat the larvæ of Wasps, which they roast in the combs. In taking the nests, they drive off the Wasps by means of a burning rag fastened to the end of a stick. The combs are sold at the bazaar of Port Louis.[599]
The following story, of the cunning of the fox in killing the Wasps to obtain their combs, is told by Ælian: “The fox (a subtile creature) is said to prey upon the Wasp in this manner: he puts his tail into the Wasps’ nest so long till it be all covered with Wasps, which he espying, pulls it out and beats them against the next stone or tree he meets withall till they be all dead, this being done again and again till all the Wasps be destroyed, he sets upon their combs and devours them.”[600]
The Chinese Herbal contains a singular notion, prevalent also in India, concerning the generation of the Sphex, or solitary Wasp. When the female lays her eggs in the clayey nidus she makes in houses, she incloses the dead body of a caterpillar in it for the subsistence of the worms when they are hatched. Those who observed her entombing the caterpillar did not look for the eggs, and immediately concluded that the Sphex took the worm for the progeny, and say, that as she plastered up the hole of the nest, she hummed a constant song over it, saying, “_Class with me! class with me!_”--and the transformation gradually took place, and was perfected in its silent grave by the next spring, when a winged Wasp emerged, to continue its posterity the coming autumn in the same mysterious way.[601]
Apidæ--Bees.
Concerning the piety of Bees, we find the following legends:
“A certaine simple woman having some stals of Bees which yeelded not vnto her hir desired profit, but did consume and die of the murraine; made her mone to another woman more simple than hir selfe: who gave her councel to get a consecrated host or round Godamighty and put it among them. According to whose advice she went to the priest to receive the host; which when she had done, she kept it in hir month, and being come home againe she tooke it out and put it into one of hir hives. Wherevpon the murraine ceased, and the honey abounded. The woman therefore lifting vp the hive at the due time to take out the honie, sawe there (most strange to be seene) a chapel built by the Bees with an altar in it, the wals adorned by marvelous skil of architecture with windowes conveniently set in their places: also a dore and a steeple with bels. And the host being laid vpon the altar, the Bees making a sweet noise flew round about it.”[602]
Mr. Hawker’s legend is to this effect: A Cornish woman, one summer, finding her Bees refused to leave their “cloistered home” and had “ceased to play around the cottage flowers,” concealed a portion of the Holy Eucharist which she obtained at church:
She bore it to her distant home, She laid it by the hive To lure the wanderers forth to roam, That so her store might thrive;-- ’Twas a wild wish, a thought unblest, Some evil legend of the west.
But lo! at morning-tide a sign For wondering eyes to trace, They found above that Bread, a shrine Rear’d by the harmless race! They brought their walls from bud and flower, They built bright roof and beamy tower!
Was it a dream? or did they hear Float from those golden cells A sound, as of a psaltery near, Or soft and silvery bells? A low sweet psalm, that grieved within In mournful memory of the sin![603]
The following passage, from Howell’s _Parley of Beasts_, furnishes a similar legend of the piety of Bees. Bee speaks:
“Know, sir, that we have also a religion as well as you, and so exact a government among us here; our hummings you speak of are as so many hymns to the Great God of Nature; and there is a miraculous example in _Cæsarius Cisterniensis_, of some of the Holy Eucharist being let fall in a meadow by a priest, as he was returning from visiting a sick body; a swarm of Bees hard-by took It up, and in a solemn kind of procession carried It to their hive, and their erected an altar of the purest wax for it, where it was found in that form, and untouched.”[604]
Butler, quoting Thomas Bozius, tells us the following:
“Certaine theeves (thieves) having stolen the silver boxe wherein the wafer-Gods vse to lie, and finding one of them there being loath, belike, that he should lie abroad all night, did not cast him away, but laid him under a hive: whom the Bees acknowledging advanced to a high roome in the hive, and there insteade of his silver boxe made him another of the whitest wax: and when they had so done, in worshippe of him, and set howres they sang most sweetly beyond all measure about it: yea the owner of them took them at it at midnight with a light and al. Wherewith the bishop being made acquainted, came thither with many others: and lifting vp the hive he sawe there neere the top a most fine boxe, wherein the host was laid, and the quires of Bees singing about it, and keeping watch in the night, as monkes do in their cloisters. The bishop therefore taking the host, carried it with the greater honour into the church: whether many resorting were cured of innumerable diseases.”[605]
Another legend, from the School of the Eucharist, is as follows:
“A peasant swayed by a covetous mind, being communicated on Easter-Day, received the Host in his mouth, and afterwards laid it among his bees, believing that all the Bees of the neighborhood would come thither to work their wax and honey. This covetous, impious wretch was not wholly disappointed of his hopes; for all his neighbors’ Bees came indeed to his hives, but not to make honey, but to render there the honours due to the Creator. The issue of their arrival was that they melodiously sang to Him songs of praise as they were able; after that they built a little church with their wax from the foundations to the roof, divided into three rooms, sustained by pillars, with their bases and chapiters. They had there also an Altar, upon which they had laid the precious Body of our Lord, and flew round about it, continuing their musick. The peasant ... coming nigh that hive where he had put the H. Sacrament, the Bees issued out furiously by troops, and surrounding him on all sides, revenged the irreverence done to their Creator, and stung him so severely that they left him in a sad case. This punishment made this miserable wretch come to himself, who, acknowledging his error, went to find out the parish priest to confess his fault to him....” etc.[606]
We quote also another from the School of the Eucharist:
“A certain peasant of Auvergne, a province in France, perceiving that his Bees were likely to die, to prevent this misfortune, was advised, after he had received the communion, to reserve the Host, and to blow it into one of the hives. As he tried to do it, the Host fell on the ground. Behold now a wonder! On a sudden all the Bees came forth out of their hives, and ranging themselves in good order, lifted the Host from the ground, and carrying it in upon their wings, placed it among the combes. After this the man went out about his business, and at his return found that this advice had succeeded ill, for all his Bees were dead....”[607]
We will close this series of legends with one from the Lives of the Saints:
“When a thief by night had stolen St. Medard’s Bees, they, in their master’s quarrel, leaving their hive, set upon the malefactor, and eagerly pursuing him which way soever he ran, would not cease stinging of him until they had made him (whether he would or no) to go back again to their master’s house; and there, falling prostrate at his feet, submissly to cry him mercy for the crime committed. Which being done, so soon as the Saint extended unto him the hand of benediction, the Bees, like obedient servants, did forthwith stay from persecuting him, and evidently yielded themselves to the ancient possession and custody of their master.”[608]