274 DEVASTATIONS OF INSECTS. 



which far excelled those of all his competitors. No 

 one could imagine what means he used for this pur- 

 pose, till he acknowledged that the flesh-maggot was 

 the workman he employed, by suffering it to devour 

 the fleshy parts. In their devastations, they have 

 often destroyed the hopes of the husbandman, and 

 threatened famine to a whole district. Locusts have 

 been known to darken the air, and to devour every 

 green thing, leaving destruction and terror behind 

 them. The white ants in Africa and the West Indies 

 are very formidable, both abroad and in the house, as 

 they spare hardly any substance that comes in their 

 way ; wood, paper, &c. are devoured with undistin- 

 guishing fury. Dr. Darwin remarks, that the small 

 green insect that often covers the stems and leaves of 

 plants, called the aphis, if its innumerable tribes were 

 not thinned by various rapacious enemies, would de- 

 stroy every kind of vegetable, and starve the whole 

 human race. But, by the wise appointment of an 

 all-discerning Providence, it is so ordered that a ba- 

 lance is preserved : one species serves as a check upon 

 another, and maintains a due proportion. 



The minuteness of insects, and the small recesses 

 in which they conceal themselves, withdraw them 

 from our notice, so that the habits of many of them 

 are very imperfectly known ; yet there are some par- 

 ticulars so curious and interesting, mentioned by Mr. 



