even those also to
confirm them.

These threads therefore I find to be a _congeries_ of small _Laminae_ or
plates, as eeeee, &c. each of them shap'd much like this of abcd, in the
fourth _Figure_, the part ac being a ridge, prominency, or stem, and b and
d the corners of two small thin Plates that grow unto the small stalk in
the middle, so that they make a kind of little feather; each of these
Plates lie one close to another, almost like a company of sloping ridge or
gutter Tyles; they grow on each side of the stalk opposite to one another,
by two and two, from top to bottom, in the manner express'd in the fifth
Figure, the tops of the lower covering the roots of the next above them;
the under side of each of these laminated bodies, is of a very dark and
opacous substance, and suffers very few Rays to be trajected, but reflects
them all toward that side from whence they come, much like the foil of a
Looking-glass; but their upper sides seem to me to consist of a multitude
of thin plated bodies, which are exceeding thin, and lie very close
together, and thereby, like mother of Pearl shells, do not onely reflect a
very brisk light, but tinge that light in a most curious manner; and by
means of various positions, in respect of the light, they reflect back now
one colour, and then another, and those most vividly.

Now, that these colours are onely _fantastical_ ones, that is, such as
arise immediately from the refractions of the light, I found by this, that
water wetting these colour'd parts, destroy'd their colours, which seem'd
to proceed from the alteration of the reflection and refraction. Now,
though I was not able to see those hairs at all transparent by a common
light, yet by looking on them against the Sun, I found them to be ting'd
with a darkish red colour, nothing a-kin to the curious and lovely greens
and blues they exhibited.

What the reason of colour seems to be in such thin plated bodies, I have
elsewhere shewn. But how water cast upon those threads destroys their
colours, I suppose to be perform'd thus; The water falling upon these
plated bodies from its having a greater congruity to Feathers then the Air,
insinuates it self between those Plates, and so extrudes the strong
reflecting Air, whence both these parts grow more transparent, as the
_Microscope_ informs, and colourless also, at best retaining a very faint
and dull colour. But this wet being wasted away by the continual
evaporations and steams th