The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1856-04-26
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INSECT POWER.

IQelnonStrdtlng DIVINE wisdom III the lower
walks Of creation, as conclusveiy as the teles-
cope unfolds 1t in the wonders of the heavens
The lamin9 of microscope insect proclaim
the existence Of an aIl-wse and omnpotent
| Creator. The following extract from the Ex-
celsior, an English journal, gives an insight
tinto some of the marvels Of the insect world
The muscular strength Of insects is i'm
mense. We once were surprised by feat per-
formed by a common beetle in. the United
States. We had put the insect for want OF
any box at hand, beneath quart bottle full OF
milk upon 4 table, the hollow at the bottom
lallowing him room to stand upright Pres
emily, to our surprise, the bottle began slowly
TO move and glide along the smooth table, pro
PEELED by the muscular power of the imprison-
ed insect, and continued for some time to per-
lambulate the surface, to the astonishment Of
lall who witnessed it, The weight of the bot
tie and its contents could not have been less
than three pounds and half; while that of the
beetle was about half an ounce, so that it
readily moved weight 112 times exceeding
its own a better notion than figures can
convey, will be obtained Of this feat by suppos-
sing lad of fifteen to be imprisoned under the
great bell of st. PauPs which weighs 1900
pounds, and to move it to and fro upon as mooth
pavement by pushing within.
Mr.. Newport has given other instances of
insect power equally remarkable. Having
once fastened a small kind of Caabus, an ele
gantly formed ground beetle, weighing three
and half grains, by silk thread TO piece
OF paper, he laid weight on the latter Alta
distance of ten inches from its load the insect
was able to drag after it, upon an inclined
place OF twenty-five degrees nearly eightv-fiye
grains, but when placed on a plane of five de-
grees inclination, it drew after it one pound
and twenty-five grains, exclusive OF the fric-
ton to overcome in moving its load, as though
man were to drag up hill Of similar inclina-
a wagon weighing two tons and a half having
first taken the wheels off,
According to the same excellent authority,
the stag beetle-Lucgaluscer been
known to gnaw a hole an inch in diameter
through the side of an iron canister in which
it was confined, and or which the marks of its
jaws was distinctly visible, as proved by Mr.
Stephens, who exhibited the canister at one
of the meetings of the chronological So
cicty.
| Let us look at the powers of insects excr-
cised in the act of flying. The house flies
the ceiling for hours together, ordinarily move
at the rate of about five feet per second; but
if excited to speed, they can dart along
through thrty-five feet in the same brief space
of time Now in this period, as Kirby and
Spence observe race-horse could clear only
nety feet, which is at the rate of more than
a mile in a minute" Our little fly, in her
swifest flight, viii go more than one third of
q mile. Now compare the immense difference
of the size of the two animals-ten millions
of the fly would hardly counterpoise one racer
and hoy wonderful will the velocity of this
minute creature appear! Did the fly equal the
race horse in size, and retain it's powers in the
ratio Of its magnitude, it would traverse the
globe with the rapidity of lightning. Some of
the flies thai haunt our gardens, shoot along so
rapidly that the eye cannot follow them in
flight.
Nor are these tiny creatures less matters Of
the arts of running and leaping. DeLisle
mentions fly so minute as almost to be inyis
ible, which ran nearly six inches in a second,
and in that space was calculated to have made
one thousand and eighty steps! This, accord
ing to the calculation of Kirby and Spence, is
| as if man whose steps measured only two
feet, should runat the incredible rate Of twenty
miles in minute.
Every one has had occasion to observe not
always without an emotion Of anger, the leap
| ing powers of the fea-PuliG irritans. A
bound of two hundred times its own length is
common feat, as if man SHOULD jump twelve
hundred feet, or a quarter of mile! What a
| pity that insects were not allowed to be COM
petitors in the athletic games of old!
|