INSECTS INJURIOUS TO THE VINE. 135 



ralists to mistake it ; it is to this latter insect we must refer 

 the winged cantharide, of a pale red colour, to which, on 

 account of its virulent and deadly poison, Epiphanius likens 

 heresy.'^ The cantharide of Origen,'* which is produced from 

 a larva subsisting on the flesh of the ass, is still different 

 from those of St. Epiphany, Dioscorides, Aristotle, and 

 Aristophanes ; though probably most nearly allied to the last 

 mentioned. 



Pliny mentions various kinds of cantharis,^ but it is not 

 easy, for want of a proper description, to make them out ; when, 

 however, he says (lib. xviii. chap. 44) — " Est et cantharis dictus 

 scarabseus parvus frumenta erodens,"^ we immediately recog- 

 nise the little formidable beetle to which, in this place, he gives 

 the name cantharis. Theophrastus, who has also spoken of 

 this little insect, which breeds in wheat, gives it the same 

 name. 



From all that has been just said, it results, that in order to 

 find the insect to which the name cantharis was applied, 

 considered by the ancients as injurious to the vine, we must 

 look among perfect insects in the class Coleoptera ; amongst 

 such as have brilliant colours, or are known for their venomous 

 or vesicatory properties ; but which are as likely to be of 

 large as small size. 



9. Kampus and Phteirus. 



I here bring these words together, though they have very 

 different meanings, because they occur together in a passage 

 of the Geoponicks,s the only one in which the first is mentioned 

 in connexion with the vine. The author gives a receipt in 

 use in Africa for protecting the vine from the phteirus and 

 kampus which breed on it. Ctesias also mentions the phteiri 

 as being destructive to the vine in Greece.'^ 



*= S. Epiph. Pan. rom. p. 1067, ed. Petaz. 



•' Orig. Co7it. Cels. lib. iv. c. 57, p. 549, et ed. Delarue. 



"^ Plin. Nat. Hist. liv. xxix. c. 30; torn. iii. p. 107, de I'edit. de Miller. 



'' Plin. Hist. Nat. c. 44, ou 17; torn. vi. p. 138, de I'edit. Franzius. 



g Gcoponic. edit. Niklas, cap. 30 ; torn. iii. p. 485. 



*" Ctesias Tndicor. cap. 21, p. 253, edit, Baehr. Francof. 1824, in Svo. 



