236 rXDlRECT INJUnlES caused by IxVSECTS. 



out the cause of the destruction of the oak-timber in 

 the royal dock-yards ; and, having detected the lurking^ 

 culprit under the form of a beetle, (Lj/7nexj/lon na- 

 vale, F.), by directing tlie timber to be immersed during 

 the time of the metamorphosis of that insect and its sea- 

 son of oviposition, furnished a remedy wliich effectually 

 secured it fi'om its future attacks^. — No coleopterous 

 insects are more singular than -those t'lat belong to the 

 genus JPausus, L. ; and one of them at least, remark- 

 able for emitting a phosplioric light from the globes of 

 its antennae, is also a tiniber-fecder''. — Amongst the 

 Hr/meno^tera there are many insects that injure us in 

 this department. The species of the genus Sire.r, pro- 

 bably all of them in their larva state have no appetite 

 but for ligneous food. Linne has observed this with 

 respect to S. Spectrum and Camelus ; and Mr. Marsham, 

 on the authority of Sir Joseph Banks, relates that se- 

 veral specimens of S. Gigas were seen to come out of 

 the floor of a nursery in a gentleman's house, to the no 

 small alarm and discomfiture of both nurse and chil- 

 dren^. — The genus Tr?/po.rj/lon, F., many species of 

 Crabro, F., Vespa Parictum, L,, Latreille's genera 

 X/ylocopa, Chchstoma, Ilcriades, 3JcgacMle and An^ 

 thophora,(-A\[ separated from Apis,J^.,) perforate posts 

 and rails and other timber, to form cells for their young'^ 

 The Linnean order Apiera furnishes another timber- 

 eating insect, a kind of wood-louse, thougli scarcely an 

 eighth of the size of the common one, {Limtwria tcrC' 

 brans of Dr. Leach,) which in point of rapidity of exe- 



" Smltirs Ititrnduclion to Botany, Pref. xv. 



'' Afzelius in Linn. Trans, iv. 261. ' IJnn. Trans, x. 103. 



" Kiiby, Mon. Ap. Ang, i. 152-194. Latrcillc, O'c/j. iv. 161—, 



