384) MODERN CLASSIFICATION OF INSECTS. 



of the Association was published by Ridgway in 1834', in which much 

 practical information was given, but no facts were published upon the 

 early history of the insect. The same subject was accordingly 

 adopted by the Entomological Society for one of the prize essays es- 

 tablished by that body ; and a memoir by Mr. H. Le Keux, in which 

 the history of H. nemorum is traced, has since been published in the 

 second volume of the Transactions of the Society, in which it is 

 stated that the larvte feed in the interior of the leaves, thus confirming 

 the observation of Latreille, that the larvae devour the parenchyma of 

 leaves, and undergo their transformations in this situation. My 

 figure 47. 5. represents part of a turnip leaf; a, the mined part of the 

 leaf; b, the larva in the widest part of the mine, seen through the 

 semitransparent pellicle of the leaf; c, the beetle of the natural size; 

 and d, holes made by the beetle ; and figure i?. 8. represents the 

 larva magnified, copied from Mr. Le Keux's plate. See further upon 

 this subject the Magazine of Natural History, No. 8.; the Gardener s 

 Magazine, vol. iii. p. 331., vol. iv. p. 36. ; Memoirs of the Manchester 

 Naturcd History, 2d series, vol. v. ; Rusticus, in Eidomol. 3Iag. No. 4. ; 

 and my article in the Gardener's Magazine, No. 84-., and in Mag. Nat. 

 Hist. vol. vii. p. 430., in opposition thereto ; and the Report of the 

 Doncaster Association above noticed. Dr. Hammerschmidt has ob- 

 served the transformations of H. hemispherica, whicli he thus 

 describes " Larva subcutanea, in foliis Clematidis adorataj vivens 

 (distentio pustuliformis), nympha in pilula ex terra formata, in quani 

 larva plane adulta sese abscondit." [Obscrv. Path. Physiol, de Plant. 

 Gallar. ortu, Vienna^, 1832, pi. 1.) Li the spring of 1837 the vines in 

 the neighbourhood of Montpellier were attacked to so great an extent 

 by Haltica oleracea in the perfect state, that fears were entertained 

 for the plants, and religious processions were instituted for the 

 purpose of exorcising the insects {Ann. Sac. Ent. de France, 1 837, 

 p. 49.) In Sillimann's American Journal, No. 54., is contained a 

 memoir upon Haltica chalybea (Chrysomela vitivora) which, as its 

 name implies, attacks the vines. 



There are about 120 British species of these saltatorial insects, 

 which have been distributed by Latreille and Stephens into various 

 genera. South America also possesses a very great number of species 

 of larger size than the European ones. 



