348 



INSECTS ABROAD. 



doubtful to me, however, whether the action, even of the 

 maxilla3, can be transverse, or whether the insect can be said 

 to bite its food." 



Without exception our English species of the Thripidae are 

 exceedingly small, some so minute as to be scarcely recog- 

 nisable as insects. Take the finest of fine-pointed steel pens, 

 draw with it the lightest possible line as long as the letter " i '' 

 (without the dot), and that will give a tolerable idea of the 

 average English Thrips. Small as they are, they are both 

 directly and indirectly injurious to man. They are directly 

 injurious by their inveterate habit of getting into the eye and 

 causing severe pain, the tasseled end of the wings being highly 



Fig. 172.— Idolothrips sp^ 

 (Blaolt.) 



irritant. This habit they share witli the smaller Eove Beetles, 

 whose turned-up tails are as painful to- the eye as the wings of 

 the Thrips. 



They are indirectly injurious in consequence of the mischief 

 which they do among plants, especially in greenhouses and hot- 

 houses, where the leaves of the plants are often quite blackened 

 by the numbers of these tiny creatures. They infest the garden 

 and field as well as the greenhouse; the vegetable marrow, French 

 beans, and other plants being subject to their attacks. They 

 even damage the wheat, getting between the fiower and the 

 grain and depriving the future seed of its moisture. Both on 

 the Continent and in England the wheat has suffered so severely 

 from the inroads of the Thrips, that nearly one-third of the crop 

 has been rendered useless. 



The species which is shown in the illustration is a native of 



