FAMILY BOSTKKHin.E. 98 



I>0,Stl'if'lli(l;i'. 



This famil}' is distiriguishrd hy tlie cyliiuliical luim .,1' thr iii-trt, Jind by llie trout >'i' the 

 prothorax, which is ohliqvifly fiiiiicate. In thi> flinuitc Ihcsn- insects are small, Init within 

 the tropics there are some laige species. Tli< y all infest forest frees, burrowing either 

 l)ein>ath the hark or into the wood. Tl^'owt'r they possess of j)enetrating hard siibslancen 

 is (jiiite remarkable : seasoned timber is easily cut by them, and the lead of the roofs of 

 houses scarcely presents an obstructi<.>n. .\t Turin, carlridgcs stored in barrels were eaten 

 through, and the leaden balls gnawed an eighth of an inch in ilepth. The Bostric/tus ca- 

 pucinus, the species on which the genus was first established by Gi;oKmoY,has been found 

 gnawing type metal, which is considerably harder than lead. Their bodies are hard, and 

 generally black or of a dark rusty brown : the thorax is dilated before ; the antennte short, 

 and terminate in three large serrated joints. The larvfP are wood-eaters also, of a whitish 

 color, wrinkled above, and furnished with six legs. 



Genus AIWTE. HosTRicirt s (Oliv.). 

 Elytra spinose and retuse posteriorly : antenna? with the second joint elongate, eylindric ; 

 terminal joints forming a perfoliated club. 



Apate basilaris. 

 Color black or dark brown : prothorax rough and punctured ; base of the elytra red, 

 punctuied, and the posterior extremity obliquely truncate and furnished with three 

 teeth on each side. Length rather more than one-fJairth of an inch. 



This species is found as far south as Carolina. It perfJaates the shagbark hiekojy dia- 

 metrically through the trunk to the very heart, where it undergoes its transformations at 

 the bottom of its Inirrow ( Hauuis on injurious insects). 



In Italy, the branches of the .Mnnis mitlticauHs are perforated by the .ijjate sexdentati.. 

 Many other species commit great havoc in forests, perforating the wood and buriowing 

 beneath the liark, by which the circulation of the sap is cut oft'. 



Dr. HALDE.MAN remarks in a manuscript note, that some strips of hickory which he had 

 employed to confine rose plants were destroyed in two years. The hickory is a tree that 

 suffei*s much from the attacks of Iwring insects ; and hoop-poles made of hickory sajdings 

 are freijuently destroyed, or rendered useless in a few months. Barrel hoops, made of this 

 excrll'Mit material, are often attacked, so that much inconvenience, if not actual loss, may 

 be the result. The proper remedy seems to be the immersion of the jioh s in water, or 

 storing them in cellars, during the deposition of the eggs. The latter mode is sometimes 

 adopted, but the former would have the advantage of destroying young grubs already 

 deposited. 



