576 
but to be of any avail the water must be well mixed up and stirred at 
the time of using it, as the Paris green or arsenic is only partially 
soluble in water, and requires to be thoroughly disseminated throughout 
the water, to be deposited as a slight coating of poisonous powder on the 
leaves to be of any avail. When Paris green or arsenical compounds 
are used great care must be taken not to make the mixture too strong, 
or they will kill or injure the leaves and plants. When used as a pow- 
der dusted over the plants, the plants must be wet in order to make the 
powder adhere to the leaves. Rains will wash the mixture away from 
the leaves, and it will have to be renewed after heavy showers. Some 
glutinous or sticky substance may be used with the Paris green and 
flour in order to cause it to adhere to the leaves, but it is not necessary. 
Sour or spoiled flour will answer as well as the best; plaster, ashes, and 
even dust have, in some cases, been substituted for the flour, but has not 
answered the purpose as well as flour. Applying the Paris green on the 
first appearance of the caterpillars is recommended, and as soon as pos- 
sible after the second crop of worms appear on the plants also. No 
notice has been taken of patent insect-destroyers, as the patentees 
claim a private and exclusive right to use them. Only avery few cases 
of injury to man or beast have been observed, and even some of those 
cases are not well substantiated by proof. It, however, would be well 
to caution persons using this poison to be on the windward side when 
dusting or showering it on the plants, and not to let stock in to feed 
upon the foliage. The prejudice of the negroesagainst using Paris green is 
now partially removed. The application of Paris green not strong 
enough to injure the cotton will kill the beggar’s-lice weed in the rows. 
One or two of the favorable accounts of the success of Paris green in 
certain localities must be considered, however, as occurring in the same 
neighborhoods where the worms mysteriously disappeared in neighbor- 
ing fields without the aid of the poison. Fires are said by some plant- 
ers to be of use in attracting and destroying the moth or miller, and by 
others to be injurious, as attracting moths from neighboring plantations ; 
and it has been observed that the cotton has been very much attacked 
immediately around such fires afterward, as ifthe moths had been at- 
tracted by the fire and deposited their eggs in the vicinity. Torches are 
of no avail unless generally used by all the planters in a neighborhood, 
except when placed over pans or dishes containing some adhesive sub- 
stance, and into which they fall. Great complaints have been made by 
planters about the indiscriminate destruction of insectivorous birds, 
which ought to be protected by law, as they are exceedingly useful in 
destroying the cotton-caterpillar. Some planters used salt-water in 
the proportion of a gill to a bucketful, and thought they experienced 
beneficial results from its use, while others plowed between the rows 
with pine brush fastened to the swingle-tree in order to sweep off the 
caterpillars from the plants onto the ground, where they are either 
buried under the earth or scorched to death before they are able to re- 
ascend the plants. Kerosene-oil, cresylic soap, and other preparations 
have been used, but to no great extent, though with some beneficial 
results. Turkeys driven into the field, as in the case of the tobacco-worms 
in Maryland and Virginia, will quickly exterminate many of the cater- 
pillars, and have been highly spoken of by three of our correspondents. 
In many cases the correspondents consider that when the cotton is 
attacked quite late in the season, and after the last bolls are formed, the 
caterpillars are rather a benefit than injurious, as by eating off the 
dense foliage, the air and sunlight being admitted, the bolls that would 
otherwise not ripen and open are fully matured. 
