86 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 



larger than peas. The inhabitants frequently cut 

 down these trees, for the purpose of getting from 

 its top the unexpanded terminal leaf-bud, which 

 weighs many pounds and is of a cylindrical form — 

 this is called the Palm-cabbage, and is eaten in 

 soups, or is boiled and prepared with vinegar and 

 oil as a salad, and has really a delightful taste. 

 Then they make incisions in the trunk, in order 

 to entice the Snout-beetle there by the evaporation 

 of the sap, and to have her deposit her eggs in it 

 that they may afterwards obtain a large crop of 

 maggots. 



Another species of Snout-beetle is the 

 Wheat-ioeevil (Calandra granaria), which is not 

 larger than a flea, oblong and chestnut-coloured. 

 These Insects do immense injuries in granaries, by 

 boring a hole with their snout into the grains of 

 wheat, or barley, or rye, and depositing therein an 

 egg^ from which proceeds a white maggot, which 

 devours all the farinaceous substance, so that nothing 

 remains but the hull. These maggots live in this 

 condition about thirty days, when they metamorphose 

 into white cocoons, from which after about ten days 

 the perfect Insects proceed, the females of which 

 immediately deposit their eggs, each laying about 

 one hundred and fifty. 



This Wheat-weevil is originally a native of Europe, 



