Another Extract of a Letter Written from Midleton in Warwickshire to the Publisher July 10th. by Francis Willughby Esquire; About the Hatching of a Kind of Bee, Lodged in Old Willows

Another Extract of a Letter written from Midleton in Warwickshire to the Publisher July 1st by Francis Willughby Esquire; about the Hatching of a kind of Bee, lodged in Old Willows. The Cartrages that I got at A*bro* near a Twelfmonth ago, do now almost every day afford me a Bee; and I can hear them gnawing out their way before I see them: So that there is nothing irregular in the way of breeding of these Bees. But the contrivance of God and Nature in it is very admirable. Having shut their young ones in those Cells with sufficient provision, they all, as well the uppermost as lowermost, before Winter come to their full growth, or are turn'd into Nymphas; in which condition they are designed to lie all Winter, as the most of Insects do. The next Summer those must necessarily be first excited out of their torpor, and changed into Flyers by the external heat and air, that lie next it. If any be laid so late, that they have not time enough to come to the state of Nymphas before Winter, they will most certainly die; and then it is no loss nor inconvenience, though their Cells be perforated. The Scolopendra, spoken of by the German Philosophers in Numb. 8. p. 2082. §. 31. of the Transactions, is that which is our Brachus, described by Muffet, in the latter part of his Chapter de Julis, p. 202. I saw it in the Cloisters of Trinity College in Cambridge, 12 or 13 years ago. It shall go hard, but I will send you some shortly. I am, &c. A further Accompt of the Stellar Fish; formerly described in Numb. 57. p. 1153; with the Addition of some other Curiosities. This Accompt was communicated by the same Gentleman, that imparted the former, in a Letter written from Boston in New England Oct. 26. 1670. as followeth: Since