*
(* Farmer Young, of Norton-farm, says that this spring (1777)
about four acres of his wheat in one field was entirely destroyed by
slugs, which swarmed on the blades of corn, and devoured it as fast
as it sprang.)
These hints we think proper to throw out in order to set the
inquisitive and discerning to work.
A good monography of worms would afford much entertainment
and information at the same time, and would open a large and new
field in natural history. Worms work most in the spring; but by no
means lie torpid in the dead months; are out every mild night in the
winter, as any person may be convinced that will take the pains to
examine his grass-plots with a candle; are hermaphrodites, and
much addicted to venery, and consequently very prolific.
I am, etc.
Letter XXXVI
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
Selborne, Nov. 22, 1777.
Dear Sir,
You cannot but remember that the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh
of last March were very hot days; so sultry that everybody
complained and were restless under those sensations to which they
had not been reconciled by gradual approaches.
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