182 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [September, 



is claimed for it. This remedy was brought to my notice about two weeks 

 ago while at West Point, my old home, on business connected with my 

 work for the Division of Entomology. The remedy i:; simply this: The 

 cabbage plants are sprinkled with ordinary corn-meal while they are wet 

 with dew or immediately after a rain, so that the meal will cling to the 

 leaves at all points. My informant certainly had nice cabbages that were 

 free from worms, and all he had done in the way of a preventive or 

 remedy was to use this corn-meal as above directed or explained. He 

 claimed that in a few days after sprinkling on the meal all the worms 

 would be found dead and turned black, clinging to the leaves of the plants. 

 Several cabbages that had purposely been left untreated were rather full 

 of the caterpillars of different sizes. In order to test the corn-meal remedy 

 for myself I treated these. On the loth of October I received the cab- 

 bages thus treated by express, just as they were when cut from the roots. 

 The accompanying letter reads as follows : " The worms seem to become 

 torpid at first, at least inactive, and then seem to dry up. How the meal 

 acts on the worms I cannot say. Cannot say whether they eat it by itself 

 or whether it gets mixed up with the leaves they eat, or whether the meal 

 that gets on them by adhering to them, acts like a poison on them. The 

 meal does not seem to do any good unless there is a heavy dew on the 

 cabbages, and it will adhere well. Perhaps they get killed by the meal 

 getting on them while the dew is on them. But I think not." When the 

 cabbages were received by me the worms were dead and partly dried up, 

 just as they had been described to me. I do not know what to think of 

 the matter, and give the facts as they appear here. 



POTASSIUM IODIDE FOR BEE STINGS. I have never seen this salt men- 

 tioned as a sting-cure, but having heard of its use by a bee keeper of forty 

 years standing, whose verdict was " relief and cure instantaneous," I tried 

 it. I have only used it in three cases, in all of which it was successful. A 

 juvenile cousin aged seven, was stung on the hand, land the cure was so 

 effective that the sting only "tickled" next day, as he expressed it, though 

 he looked as if the tickling was too much for him at the time. In my own 

 case the relief was instantaneous, and no swelling ensued the first time, 

 when the remedy was applied at once, and very little the second time, 

 when applied about five minutes after. The method of application is 

 simply to hold a crystal of the iodide to the wound. H. E. W. in the 

 "British Bee Journal," June 23, 1892. 



SOAPSUDS FOR CABBAGE LICE. "Some tiim- ago we undertook a line 

 of experiments against them, using kerosene emulsion of different 

 strengths. The result was that a weak emulsion had little or no effect, 

 while a stronger one thoroughly applied killed the lice, but at the same 

 time ruined the cabbage by giving it a flavor of kerosene which remained 

 \vht-n it was brought on the table. After some further study a trial was 

 made of strong soapsuds alone, and this proved highly efficacious, giving 

 much better satisfaction than any other remedy for the pest ever used at 



