60 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 
In almost all the different seeds we find very small mag- 
gots, which are afterward metamorphosed into Coleopterous 
Insects, and are on that account called Seed Beetles. These 
animals, like the ones we have just described, have a pro- 
longed snout, but comparatively much shorter, and a very 
short body. 
The most destructive among them is the PEa-wEEviL 
(Bruchus Pisi), famous in Europe, but much moré common 
in America, the larve of which live in peas. The Beetle 
itself is about the size of a bed-bug; round, flat on the up- 
per surface, of a dark-brown color, with white spots upon 
the thorax and wing-covers. 
When the peas are in blossom and begin to have pods, 
the females deposit their eggs upon them, and we find, 
therefore, a very small maggot in almost every green pea, 
the existence of which can only be perceived by a small 
black dot upon it. In almost every seed-pea, also, we find 
a perfect Beetle, or at least an aperture from which it has 
already crawled out. 
Now as this is a fact of the truth of which every one 
can convince himself, it is safe to assert that in eating 
ereen peas we at the same time eat almost the same num- 
ber of maggots. If, therefore, we are disposed to be dis- 
gusted with the Palm-worm eaters, we would do well to 
remember that we practice the same thing in the case of the 
Pea-weevil. 
In some parts of Europe they put their seed-peas into 
hot water before planting, for the purpose of killing these 
Beetles; and several of our scientific American Horticultur- 
ists, according to Dr. Harris, advise to keep seed-peas in air- 
tight vessels over one year before planting them, or at least 
not to plant them before the end of May. 
The cultivation of peas is an extensive branch of agri- 
culture in the Old Country, because dry peas, well pre- 
pared, are the usual favorite dish of the farming and oper- 
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