OP THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 71 



that was the least sticky was covered with them. With such a sight 

 before one's eyes, and with full knowledge of the prolificacy of these 

 lice, it required no eiibrt to understand the fearful rapidity at which 

 the Phylloxera disease has spread in France, or the epidemic nature 

 it has assumed. Imagine such swarms, mostly composed of egg-bear- 

 ing females, slowly drifting, or more rapidly blown, from vineyard to 

 vineyard: imagine them settling upon the vines and depositing their 

 eggs, which give birth to fecund females, whose progeny in five gen- 

 erations, and probably in a single season, may be numbered by bil- 

 lions — and you have a plague (should there be no conditions to pre- 

 vent that increase) which, though almost invisible and easily unno- 

 ticed, may become as blasting as the plagues of Egypt ! 



thp: :male louse. 



M. Signoret, because he has not seen the male himself, has seen 

 fit, both in print and by letter to me, to deny that it has yet been seen 

 by any one. It may please my friend to be thus incredulous, but I 

 have certainly noticed the differences specified on page 59 of my last 

 Report, both in specimens obtained from France and those obtained 

 in this country. Both Lichtenstein and Planchon likewise believe 

 that they have seen the male, and pointed out the difl^erences before 

 I was familiar with them myself. We know positively that his pres- 

 ence is not absolutely necessary, and that the females greatly pre- 

 ponderate. A knowledge of his appearance, therefore, is of little 

 practical moment ; but as it is of considerable scientific interest, I 

 regret that I did not know of M. Signoret's skepticism in time to have 

 dispelled it the past year. Being absent from home during the months 

 of September and October, I saved no winged specimens in 1872 ; and 

 on looking at those saved in 1871, 1 found that the acetic acid in which 

 they were preserved had so destroyed them that little but a white soft 

 mass of matter was left. From a few preserved in glycerine I found 

 one specimen of what I have taken for the male; and, though dis- 

 colored, it has been forwarded to M. Signoret at his request — with 

 what results I have not yet learned. Nous verrons I 



11E3IEDIES. 



The new insecticides that have been tried, and the various mea- 

 sures that have been essayed to destroy the Phylloxera, are innumer- 

 able, and the French horticultural and agricultural journals teem 

 with them. Practically, however, the great mass of them are useless. 

 Next to carbolic acid, soot has been found most efficacious, and a mix- 

 ture of these two articles may be profitably employed to save a few 

 choice vines which are known to be suffering from Phylloxera, and 

 where they may be applied thoroughly. In this country, where the 

 disease is not likely to become threatening on our tougher rooted, 

 native varieties, these applications will never be made extensively^; 



