INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 205 



their eggs are searclied for and destroyed, and to for- 

 ward this work people often call in the assistance of 

 their neighbours''. — In the Crimea the small caterpillar 

 of a Procris or Zygasna, (lepidopterous genera sepa- 

 rated from Sphinx, L.) related to P. Statices, F., is a 

 still more destructive enemy. As soon as the buds open 

 in the spring, it eats its way into them, especially tlie 

 fruit buds, and devours the germ of the grape. Two or 

 three of these caterpillars will so injure a vine, by creep- 

 ing from one germ to anotlier, that it will bear no fruit, 

 nor produce a single regular shoot the succeeding year ** , 

 — Vine leaves in France are also frequently destroyed 

 by the larva of a moth (Pj/t'cilis vitana, F.) ; in Germany 

 another species does great injury to the young bunches, 

 preventing their expansion by the webs in which it in- 

 volves them*^ ; and a third (Pj/ralis fasciana, F.) makes 

 the grapes themselves its food : a similar insect is al- 

 luded to in the threat contained in Deuteronomy''. — 

 The worst pest of the vine in this country is its Coccus 

 (C. Vitis, L.). This animal, which fortunately is not 

 sufficiently hardy to endure the common temperature 

 of our atmosphere, sometimes so abounds upon those 

 that are cultivated in stoves and greenhouses, that their 

 stems seem quite covered with little locks of white cot- 

 ton ; which appearance is caused by a filamentous se- 

 cretion transpiring through the skin of the animal, in 

 which they envelop their eggs. Where they prevail 

 they do great injury to the plant by subtracting the sap 

 from its foliage and fruit, and causing it to bleed. — And 

 to dose the list, you are perfectly aware of the eager- 



* Host in Jacquin. Collect, iii. 29T. 



" Pallas's Travels in S. Russia, ii. 241. ' Jacquin. Collect, ii. 9T. 



" Deut. xxviii, 39. 



