In England, the Phalangium has been christened the Harvest-man, from a superstitious belief that if it be killed there will be a bad harvest.[1084]
Pedipalpi—Scorpions.
Concerning the generation of the Scorpion, Topsel, in his History of Four-footed Beasts and Serpents, printed in 1658, treats as follows:
“Now, then, it followeth that we inquire about the manner of their (Scorpions’) breed or generation, which I find to be double, as divers authors have observed, one way is
by putrefaction, and the other by laying of egges, and both these ways are consonant to nature, for Lacinius writeth that some creatures are generated only by propagation of seed—such are men, vipers, whales, and the palm-tree; some again only by putrefaction, as mice, Scorpions, Emmets, Spiders, purslain, which, first of all, were produced by putrefaction, and since their generation are conserved by the seed and egges of their own kinde. Now, therefore, we will first of all speak of the generation of Scorpions by putrefaction, and afterward by propagation.
“Pliny saith[1085] that when Sea-crabs dye, and their bodies are dried upon the earth, when the sun entereth into Cancer and Scorpius, out of the putrefaction thereof ariseth a Scorpion; and so out of the putrefied body of the crefish burned arise Scorpions, which caused Ovid thus to write:
Concava littoreo si demas brachia cancro,
Cætera supponas terræ, de parte sepulta
Scorpius exibit, caudaque minabitur unca.
And again: