12 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
needed. This is true of all the bacterial germs of insect disease thus far 
studied, and also of certain higher fungi infesting insects. 
Extensive work has been done in France by Monsieur Alfred Giard 
on a species which he calls Zsaria densa (Botrytis tenella of Prillieux and 
Delacroix), a fungus particularly destructive to species of White-grubs 
(Lachnosterna), and tubes containing the spores have been extensively 
advertised in Europe. In this country the fangus most extensively used 
in this work is known as Sporotrichum globuliferum. This has been care- 
fully cultivated and much used as a means of checking the enormous 
hordes of the injurious chinch-bug which yearly do so much harm in the 
western States. A long and interesting account of Prof. Snow's work 
in this connection will be found in the Annual Report of the Entomologi- 
cal Society of Ontario for 1892. Prof. Forbes described the parasite as 
follows: —*This fungus. which springs from minute white spores or so- 
called conidia, penetrates the living insect and finally imbeds the dead 
body of its host in a thick felt of white tibres which becomes covered with 
myriads of white or shghtly yellowish spores collected in globular heads. 
It does not form resting spores, belonging in fact to an order of fungi in 
which such spores have never been found, but it may nevertheless be 
preserved in a living state for many months —certainly over the winter 
by simply drying out the ripe conidia. We have so preserved it in fact 
for an entire year, and have found by experiment that the vitality of its 
conidia is proof against at least ordinary winter temperatures and summer 
heat of 104 degrees F.” “The fungus may be cultivated in large quanti- 
ties very readily in disinfected fruit jars on corn meal soaked with beef 
broth, the growth forming a thick layer of dust-like spores on the surface, 
which may be brushed or scraped off and preserved for use in homeopa- 

thie vials plugged with cotton. This parasite is by no means uncommon 
in Canada and occurs upon several insects. The most remarkable epide- 
mic of it which has come under my notice was in 1891 in Vancouver 
Island. For some years previous to 1891 the oaks on Vancouver Island 
had been annually defoliated in the spring by myriads of caterpillars of a 
moth known as Ellopia somniaria. In 1891 many diseased caterpillars 
were sent to me by Mr. W. H. Danby, of Victoria, and were found on 
examination to be infested with this fungus. The following year and up 
to the present time, the caterpillars have been so scarce that a single 
specimen can only be found with difficulty. It is true there were parasi- 
tic insects also at work ; but I consider that the chief cause of diminution 
of the caterpillars was due to this disease. 
Other fungi of interest which frequently do good work are the pecu- 
liar parasite of the White grub (Cordyceps melolonthæ) and an Empusa 
(E. aphidis), frequently abundant and destructive not only to myriads of 
the injurious plant-lice, but also to numerous other insects. 
