THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 115 



all kinds of turnips; also carrots, onions, and parsneps. 

 Mangold and potato seem the only things that escape them. 

 They attack the tap-root of all other plants when very 

 young. I quite think the insect in the worm state, as 

 I sent it you, punctures the roots of the different plants, and 

 deposits its egg or larva, as the first sign we see of them is a 

 small round lump on the root: this by degrees gets larger 

 and larger; and when the plant is about six or eight weeks 

 old, on cutting open this lump you will see small white 

 maggots ; these lumps and maggots go on increasing in size 

 and number until they kill the plant; and in the case of 

 Swedish turnips they form large angle-berries, like those 

 seen on some cattle ; and the turnip dies away. In the case 

 of onions you will see them the very same as you see maggots 

 in meat. Any further information I can give, if you let me 

 know, I shall be only too glad to give it, or send you speci- 

 mens in the different stages if you require it. I also beg to 

 acknowledge the receipt of your letters of the 22nd and 25th 

 inst., for both of which I return you many thanks, and I 

 enclose you further particulars respecting the insect. If you 

 can find out anything or any treatment that will banish this 

 insect you will bestow a very great favour on us and many 

 others. I have been fighting with it for years : tried all sorts 

 of manures, salts, &c. ; lime, also ; but all to no purpose. Last 

 February twelvemonth I dug into the sand hot roach lime 

 from the kiln, at the rate of' over six tons to the statute acre; 

 still this insect carried off every thing last summer; and out of 

 that very piece of sand I got the insects I sent you. — Stephen 

 F. Prince ; Ballycroy, Ballina, March 27, 1875. 



[I think Mr. Prince, in his explanatory letter, may possibly 

 have confounded several insects together. The different 

 species of Julus do not come from a white maggot, which is 

 rather the economy of a weevil than a centipede ; but I have 

 often found a Julus in the excrescences caused by other 

 enemies. — Edward Newman.] 



E. Erskine Greville. — A Luminous Centipede. — On 

 Wednesday, the 16lh of September last, 1 was spending the 

 evening with some friends at Isleworth, and was walking out 

 in the garden about nine o'clock. It was a dark night, and I 

 had come to a part of the grounds shaded by large trees, 

 when I suddenly observed what appeared to be a luminous 



