No. 105.J 273 



is performed, and that it has therefore never been seeij. The straw 

 itself being wet, and the body of the worm rendered supple by the 

 moisture surrounding it, it leaves its abode in the head of the wheat, 

 and adhering to the wet straw by the glutinousness of the surface 

 of its body, gradually works its way downwards by the^ wriggling 

 motion to which it so often resorts when disturbed, until it reaches 

 the ground. That there is such a glutinous secretion upon the sur- 

 face of the worm as would enable it to adhere to the wet straw in 

 the manner supposed, I might adduce a number of facts to prove. I 

 was desirous of taking a drawing of the larvae which I found among 

 wheat-stubble last March ; but particles of earth adhered to them 

 so firmly, that I could not separate them with the point of a needle 

 without also mutilating the worms, A few weeks since, on visiting 

 a neighbor's threshing-floor, I gathered a number of larvae by mois- 

 tening the end of my finger and touching it to the worm, which, 

 thus adhering, was scraped off upon the edge of a tin box. The box 

 is now before me, with each of the worms alive, but firmly glued to 

 its sides, and many of them to each other ; and on forcibly removing 

 some of them, the outer dried and hardened case of the worm is 

 fractured in the operation. 



It would thus appear that those worms which are matured, leave 

 the grain at the close of a shower, and crawl down the wet straw to 

 the €arth. It may be also, that a heavy night-dew sometimes fur- 

 nishes a sufficient degree of moisture to enable them to do this. 

 But on the other hand, those worms which are later in arriving at 

 maturity, in awaiting suitable weather for making the same descent are, 

 -ere such weather arrives, carried with the grain into the barn. 



As illustrating the strong tenacity of life possessed by these larvae, 

 I may in this connexion state, that the few specimens gathered in 

 March as already stated, were placed with a little earth in a vial," and 

 a piece of gauze tied over its mouth, for the purpose of ascertaining 

 the transformations of the insect, if any, from its then condition to 

 that of a winged fly. Other avocations diverted my attention, and 

 this vial was forgotten for a fortnight ; by which time the earth within 

 had become so completely dried, that not doubting but the worms had 

 all perished, no farther attention was paid to it, and it remained in a 

 vdry room over three months, until the middle of June, when, on ex- 

 amining it, half the specimens put into the vial were found to have 



[Senate, No. 105 .J 18 



