124 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



and do not cover more than one third of the abdomen. These 

 beetles eat the leaves of various kinds of buttercups. 



Our common species is the Meloe ang^sticollis of Say, or 

 narrow-necked oil-beetle. It is of a dark indigo-blue color ; the 

 thorax is very nan'ow, and the antenna? of the male are curi- 

 ously twisted and knotted in the middle. It measures from 

 eight tenths of an inch to one inch in length. It is very com- 

 mon on buttercups in the autumn, and I have also found it 

 eating the leaves of potato-vines. 



The foregoing insects are but a small number of those, 

 belonging to the order Coleoptera, which are injurious to 

 vegetation. Those only have been selected that are the most 

 remarkable for their ravages, or would best serve to illustrate 

 the families and genera to which they belong. The orders 

 Orthoptera, Hemiptera, Lepidoptera, Hymenoptera, and Di- 

 ptera, remain to be treated in the same way, in carrying out 

 the plan upon which this treatise has been begun, and to which 

 it is limited. 



