In April 1673, the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge began receiving unbelievable letters and drawings from a stranger in Holland. The mysterious author claimed he could see the smallest details of things no one had ever seen before: stomachs of lice and muscles in fleas’ legs, among other things. To the Society’s members — the most respected and influential scientists of the day — this was a foolish claim, and their interest turned to other things. Over the weeks that followed, more letters and drawings from the unknown Hollander arrived at the Royal Society. These letters went from sounding foolish to crazy. Whoever was sending them reported seeing “animalcules” in water dancing “upwards, down- wards, and ‘round about,” that were so incomprehensibly tiny “ten hundred thousand of these living creatures could scarce equal the bulk of a coarse grain of sand.” And if that didn’t sound crazy enough, the gentleman also wrote about tiny creatures shaped like eels living in his wine and wriggling about for a whole month.
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