Part 4

At three days old, are Cream-colour’d.

At one Week old, are Straw-colour’d.

At two Weeks, are of the same Colour, with a red List down the Back.

At three Weeks, List Copper Colour.

At four Weeks, List Browner.

At five Weeks, List deeper Brown.

At six Weeks, the Sides brown, and the List hardly discernible.

At seven Weeks, they come to be of their proper Colour, all over brown.

At eight Weeks, they grow bigger.

Nine Weeks, Ditto.

Ten Weeks, Ditto.

At eleven Weeks, they are full grown.

Vide the Plate done from Europeans bred: under which is a single one longer and larger, than our full-grown, being a full-grown American bred. ’Tis needless to give the Gradations of that Species, because when they spawn and breed here, the Young degenerate, and are of the European Size.

As I wrote down the Time I put up all Pairs for breeding, and also the Times they spawn’d, and observ’d and set down the Numbers they generally spawn’d; I found by my account of above forty Pair so put up with various Foods, not only their best-beloved Foods, but also their Method of Breeding; of which, to render my Observations of publick Service, I shall give you an account.

Viz. Their beloved Foods are Blood, dry’d Paste, Size, Deal, Beach, Osier, and some other Woods, the Sap of which they suck; and on any one of these will they live the Year round.

Oak, Walnut, Cedar and Mahogoney they will not feed upon; all Pairs I put up with those Woods for Food, having been soon starved to death.

Wild Buggs are watchful and cunning, and tho’ timorous of us, yet in fight one with another, are very fierce; I having often seen some (that I brought up from a day old, always inur’d to Light and Company) fight as eagerly as Dogs or Cocks, and sometimes one or both have died on the Spot. From those so brought up tame, I made the greatest Discoveries.

They are hot in Nature, generate often, and shoot their Spawn all at once, and then leave it, as Fish do.

They generally spawn about fifty at a time, of which Spawn about forty odd in about three Weeks time usually, (but sometimes two or three days more or less, according as the Weather proves more or less hot) come to life; the Residue proving addle, as do often the Eggs of Hens, &c.

Thus they spawn four times in a Season; viz. in March, May, July, and September: by which ’tis apparent to a Demonstration, that from every Pair that lives out the Season, about two hundred Eggs or Nits are produc’d; and that out of them, one hundred and sixty, or one hundred and seventy, come to Life and Perfection.

Some of the first Breed I have known to spawn the same Season they were hatched; but so few in Quantity, and those so weakly, that the Winter killed them.

I have also observed that in Rooms where constant Fires have been kept Night and Day, they have been so brisk and stout as to spawn in the Depth of Winter: but of all the Spawn I ever saw between September and March, not one ever came to Life.

This plainly evinces, that Natural Heat only produces Life in the Spawn, and that Artificial cannot.

* * * * *

Thus having shewn plainly the Number each Pair annually produce, I hope their great Increase is so sufficiently accounted for, that it need no more be wonder’d at.

And having also shewn their seven Months Season of Breeding, if ’tis admitted, as I think ’tis plainly apparent, that in the other five Months, viz. from September to March, when there is no such thing as Spawn but what is addle, and consequently cannot come to Maturity; it then naturally follows, that the Winter is the best Season for their total Destruction: which I shall make more fully appear presently, but must first refute two vulgar Errors.

The first is, That many People imagine they are dead in Winter. This is a Notion so absurd, that it would hardly be worth mentioning, had I not by Experience found it had prevail’d with many People of Sense and Learning, as well as the Vulgar and Illiterate. The many Experiments by me shown at the Hospitals in the hardest Frosts last Winter, and in the Houses of the Nobility and Gentry, and to Sir HANS SLOANE the 30th of December 1729, will, I hope, be deem’d a sufficient Refutation of that Error: For in the coldest Seasons the Application of my Liquor with a Feather only, made the Vermin bolt out of their Holes, and die before their faces.

This they will do all the Year round in the coldest or hottest Weather. And I have seen, and do assert, they do bite in the cold as well as hot Seasons: but as our Blood is not so apt to inflame in Winter as in Summer, their Bites make but little Impression, and are consequently the less regarded.