The larvæ of Bots, _Œstris ovis_, found in the heads of sheep and goats, have been prescribed, and that, from the tripod of Delphos, as a remedy for the epilepsy. We are told so on the authority of Alexander Trailien; but whether Democritus, who consulted the oracle, was cured by this remedy, does not appear; the story shows, however, that the ancients were aware that these maggots made their way even into the brain of living animals.[1007] The oracle answered Democritus as follows: Take a tame goat that hath the greatest head, Or else a wilde goat in the field that’s bred, And in his forehead a great worm you’l finde, This cures all diseases of that kinde.[1008] The common saying that a whimsical person is _maggoty_, or has got _maggots in his head_, perhaps arose from the freaks the sheep have been observed to exhibit when infested by their Bots.[1009] The following “charme for the Bots[1010] in a horse” is found in Scots’ Discovery of Witchcraft, printed in 1651: “You must both say and do thus upon the diseased horse three days together, before the sun rising: _In nomine pa†tris & fi†lii & Spiritus†sancti, Exorcize te vermen per Deum pa†trem & fi†lium & Spiritum†sanctum_: that is, In the name of God the father, the sonne, and the Holy Ghost, I conjure thee O worm by God, the Father, the sonne, and the Holy Ghost; that thou neither eate nor drink the flesh, blood, or bones of this horse; and that thou hereby maiest be made as patient as Job, and as good as S. John Baptist, when he baptized Christ in Jordan, _In nomine pa†tris & fi†lii et spiritus†sancti_. And then say three _Pater nosters_, and three _Aves_, in the right eare of the horse, to the glory of the holy trinity. Do†minus fili†us spirit†us Mari†a.”[1011] There is a popular error in England respecting the _Œstrus (Gasterophilus) equi (hæmorrhoidalis)_, which Shakspeare has followed, and which has been judiciously explained by Mr. Clark. Shakspeare makes the carrier at Rochester observe: “Peas and oats are as dank here as a dog, and that’s the next way to give _poor jades the bots_.”[1012] The larvæ of this insect, says Mr. Clark, are mostly known among the country people by the name of _wormals_, _wormuls_, _warbles_, or, more properly, _Bots_. And our ancestors erroneously imagined that poverty or improper food engendered them in horses. The truth, however, seems to be, that when the animal is kept without food the Bots are also, and are then, without doubt, most troublesome; whence it was very naturally supposed that poverty or bad food was the parent of them.[1013] A cow with its hide perforated by Warbles, in England, was said to be elf-shot: the holes being made by the arrows of the little malignant fairies. In the Northern Antiquities, p. 404, we find the following: