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Natural magick in twenty books : wherein are set forth all the riches and delights of the natural sciences
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Natural Mag ick. Bookj .

Salamander is gendred of the water ;

for the Salamander it self genders nothing, neither is there any male or femaleamoDgst them, nor yet amongst Heels, nor any kind cite ; which doth not generateof themselves either egge or young, as Tliny notcth. But now we will speak of amoll excellent generation, namely, how

Bees are generated of an Ox.

*Ælianm writes, That Oxen are commodious many wayes ; amongst the rest, thisis one excellent commodity, that being dead, there may be generated of them avery profitable kind of Creamers, namely Bees. Ovid faith it, that as all putrifiedbodies are turned into some small living Creamers, so Oxen putrified do generateiBees. Vlorentmm the Grecian faith, that fubat King of Africa, taught how to makeBees in a wooden Ark. Democritm and Varro shew a cruel manner of making Beesin a house: hut it isa very ready way. Chuse a house ten cubits high, and ten cu-bits broa , .-are every way ; but let there be buc one entrance into it, and fourwindows, < neach side one. Putin this room an Ox, about two or three years old ;let him be fat and fleshy: then set to him a company of lusty fellows, to beat hiryso cruelly, that they kill him with their cudgels, and break his bones withal: butthey must take "teat heed that they draw no blood of him, neither must theystrike him too fiercely at the first : After this, stop up all the passages of the Ox, hisnostrils, eyes, mouth, and necessary places of evacuation, with fine linen cloutsbesmeared with pitch: Then cast a great deal of honey under him, being laid withhis face upwards, and let them all go forth,and daubeup the door and the windowswith thick lomc, so that no wind, nor Air can get in. Three weeks after, open/the room, and let the light and the Air ccme in, except there where the windwould blow in too violently. And when you fee that the matter is through cold,and hath taken air enough, then shut up the door and windows as before. Abouteleven dates after,open it again, and you shall find the room full of Bees clotted to-gether, and nothing of the Ox remaining, beside the horns, the bones and thehair. They fay that the Kings ef the companies are generated of the brain, the o-therof the flesh, but the chief Kings of,all,of the marrow; yet those that ccmeof the brain, are most of them greater, handsomer , and bettcr-coloured then therest. When you open the room first, you shall find the flesh turned into small,white,and unpersect creatures, all of the fame shape, but as yet only growing, and notmoving. Afterward, at the second opening, you may fee their wings grown, theright colour of Bees in them, and how they fit about their Kings, and stutter about,especially toward the windows, where they would enjoy their desired light. Butk is best to let them light by the windows every other day. This fame experiment,Firs//hath very elegantly set down in the same manner. Now as the best kind ofBees are generated of a young Ox, so a more base kind of them is brought forthof the dead flesh of baser creatures; tÆlianus faith,

That Wastes are generated of an Horse J

when his carcase is putrified, the marrow of him brings forth Waspes ; a swift kindof fowl, from a swift kind of beast. Ovid faith, that Hornets are thence generated;and If odor e derives crabrontm a cabo,id est caballo, a hornet of a horse, because theyare brought forth of horses. Pliny and Vtrgil fay, that waspes and hornets both, aregenerated of the flesh of dead horses. In like manner

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Drones ctme of Mules,