and the people were obliged to acknowledge the inferiority of their own deities, by sueing through Moses to the God of Israel. Intreat for me, says Pharaoh. And Moses went out from Pharaoh, and intreated the Lord. Exodus,

c. viii. v. 30.

The reason, why the ostrum, or cunomyia, was thought sacred, arose probably from its being esteemed among many nations an instrument of vengeance in the hand of God. In the fable of Io this fly is sent to punish her; and to make her wander over the face

'It was expressed by the Romans both oestrus and oestrum. Estrum Græcum est, Latine asilus, vulgo tabanus vocatur. Servius in Virg. Georg. l. 3. v. 148.

Naturalists in later times distinguished between the osges, œstrum; and the us, the same as the cunomyia. However the poets, and many other writers speak of one animal under both names. Ælian says, Τον μεν μυωπα όμοιον φύναι τη xangμery, zuvoμvig. 1. 4. c. 51. p. 227. And they make the myops the same as the oestrum. -Μυων ειδος μυιας

Οι σρος καλέμενος. Hesych. Μύωψ

παρόμοιος τη κυνόμυια.

-Schol. in Odyss. x. v. 299. In the Prometheus of

Eschylus the myops and cestrum are throughout used as synonymous.

See Bochart Hierozoic. v. 2. 1. iv. p. 547.

Hence she is made to say,

-οτροπληξη τω

Μαςιγι ΘΕΙΗ. γην προ γης ελαυνομαί.

Eschyl, Prometh. p. 32. Turneb.

of the earth. And when Bellerophon was supposed to have rashly mounted the winged horse; and to have tried to pass to heaven, this fly was sent, which by rendering the horse unruly, brought him soon to the earth. The like calamity happened to Ampelus, the favourite of Bacchus. He was by the same means thrown down to the ground from a sacred bull, and killed, through the jealousy of Selene, As it was supposed to be sent at the will of heaven, people metaphorically stiled any divine, and any extravagant impulse, an œstrum. Hence Orpheus, having been forced for a long time to be in a state of wandering, says that he was at last by means of his mother Calliope freed from that madness.

Και με αλητειηστε και εξ οιστρο εσάωσε Mning nμstegn. Orph. Argonaut. v. 101. The bite or puncture of this insect was terri¬ ble: hence people's fears increased their reverence, especially when it was esteemed a messenger of the gods.

* Τον Δια μηνίσαντα οιτρον εμβαλειν τῷ Πηγασῳ όθεν εκπέσειν τον BEλλgooTH. Schol. in Homerum, l. 6. v. 155. The story taken from Asclepiades, the tragedian.

Και οι πεμπε μυωπα βοοσσοον-Nonni Dionys. 1. xi. p. 199.

The Miracle of the Flies ascertained.

The land of Egypt being annually overflowed was on that account pestered with swarms of flies. They were so troublesome, that the people, as 'Herodotus assures us, were in many places forced to lie on the tops of their houses, which were flat: where they were obliged to cover themselves with a network, called by Juvenal Conopeum. This is described by the scholiast as-linum tenuissimis maculis nexum : knitting together of line into very fine meshes. As the country abounded thus with these insects, the judgment which the people suffered might be thought to have been brought about by natural means. For both the soil and climate were adapted to the production of frogs, and flies, and other vermin: and they certainly did produce them in abundance. All this may be granted: and yet such is the texture of the holy scriptures, and these great events were by divine appointment so circumstanced, that the objection may be easily shewn to be idle and that none of these evils could

! L. 2. c. 95. p. 146.

Ut testudineo tibi, Lentule, Conopeo. Sat. 6. v. 80. So called from Kavay, a gnat, or fly.

have been brought about in the ordinary course of things. Whoever considers the history, as it is afforded us, will be obliged to determine, as the priests did, and say in every instance this was the finger of Go!. In respect to the flies, they must have been brought upon the country miraculously on account of the time of year. These insects breed chiefly in marshy places, when the waters decrease in summer, and autumn, and where moisture still abounds. Now this season in Egypt was in September and October, after the subsiding of the river. For the Nile began to rise in June, when the sun was in Cancer: but its increase was more apparent, in the next month, when the sun was in Leo: and about the end of

1

I

' Incipit crescere lunâ novâ, quæcunque post solstitium est, sensim modiceque, sole Cancrum transeunte, abundantissime autem Leonem. Pliny, vol. 1. 1. 5. p. 256.

Κατέρχεται μὲν ὁ Νείλος πληθύων, απο τροπέων των θερινεων αρξαμε νος, επι έκατον ἡμερας πελασας δε ες τον αριθμον τετεων των ημερεων Siow aжigital.—Herod. 1. 2. c. 19. p. 112. Ægyptum Niόπισω απερχεται.—Herod. lus irrigat, & cum totâ æstate obrutam oppletamque tenuit, cum recedit, mollitos atque obfimatos agros ad serendum relinquit. Cicero de Nat. Deor. 1. 2. c. 52. p. 1230.

As the chief increase of the Nile was, when the sun was passing through Leo; the Egyptians made the lion a type of an inundation, as we learn from Johannes Pierianus. He says that all effusion of water was specified by this charac

August, and sometimes about the equinox, the river began to subside and the meadows to

I

appear. Cum autem sol per Cancri sidus cœperit vehi, augescens ad usque transitum ejus in Libram, diebusque centum sublatius fluens, minuitur postea, et equitabiles campos ostendit. They are the words of Marcellinus, who had been in that country: and he agrees with other writers. Theon the scholiast upon Aratus speaks nearly to the same purpose. Τα Παωφι παυεται ὁ Νειλος, ὃς εστι κατα Ρωμαιος Oxrwegios. The Nile stops, and subsides in the month Paophi, which answers to October among the Romans. Diodorus Siculus places the commencement of its decrease more truly at the autumnal equinox, as he does its first rising at

teristic. And he adds, that from hence has been the custom of making the water, which proceeds from cisterns and other reservoirs, as well as spouts from the roofs of buildings, come through the mouth of a lion.--Apud gentes omnes uno jam consensu receptum, ut canales, tubique et siphones qui aquam eructant per terebrata foramina in leonina capita ad id locis opportunis adsculpi solita, aquam immittant, quæ inde ex leonis rectibus evomi videatur. 1. 1. c. 13. p. 9. See the whole, which is curious.

See Marci Frid. Wendelini Admiranda Nili, c. 7. p. 55. -also Orus Apollo, c. 21. p. 37.

' L. 22. p. 259.