118 



THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



country to Europe and effected an extensive and per- 

 manent settlement there. For although on one or 

 two diffovc n t occasions single specimens of our Army- 

 worm Moth {Laurama unipiincta Haw.orth) have 

 been captured in England, yet it has never hither- 

 to spread and became ruinously common there, as 

 it continually docs in America. Our destructive 

 pea-bug or rather pea-beetle {Bruchus piai Linn.) 

 has also found its way to Europe ; but although it 

 is met with in England, Kirby and Spence express- 

 ly state that it does not occur there " to any very 

 injurious extent." (Introd. letter 6.) Again, the 

 only species of White Ant that exists within the 

 limits of the United States, (^Termes frontalis Kcil- 

 lar,) has been known for a long time to be a guest 

 in the Plant-houses of Schonbrunu in Germany; 

 but it is not recorded to have ever as yet spread in- 

 to the surrounding country. A very minute yellow 

 ant, however, (^Myrmica inolcsta Say,) which often 

 infests houses throughout the United States, has, 

 according to Frederick Smith, "become generally 

 distributed and naturalized" in houses in England; 

 (Stainton's Entom. Ann. 1862, p. 70 and 1SG3, pp. 

 59 — 62;) and Kirby and Spence state more speci- 

 fically that "it has become a great pest in many 

 houses in Brighton, London and Liverpool; in 

 some cases to so great an extent as to cause the oc- 

 cupants to leave them." (hurod. Letter 8.) As to 

 the Woolly Aphis of the Apple-tree, {Eriosonia 

 laiiigera Hausmann,) which was formerly misnam- 

 ed in Europe " the ximerican Blight," it was proved 

 long ago, that instead of having been imported from 

 America into Europe, it was in reality imported 

 from Europe into America. (Harris/Hy. /ns.p. 242)* 

 The same law seems to prevail in the Vegetable 

 Kingdom also. For while we have imported from 

 the Old World a whole host of noxious weeds, but 

 very few native American plants have established 

 themselves on the other side of the Atlantic. 



" But," the curious reader will a.sk, " what can 

 be the reason for such a strange anomaly ? " The 

 reason is that, although this is popularly known as 

 the New World, it is in reality a much older world 



*A species of Cockroach (Blatta americana Burm.) has 

 also, as the name indicates, been supposed by some to 

 have been imported from America, not only into tlie sea- 

 bord ot'Kngland. but also into the Mauritius and the Isle 

 of Bourbon. It exists undoubtedly at the ]iresent day on 

 the seabord of the United States, but I suspect that it was 

 originally introduced there from Eastern Asia. West- 

 wood mentions having seen it ^' swarming in a vessel re- 

 cently arrived [in England] from the East Indies." (Jrt- 

 trod. I, p. 417.) America has so little commercial inter- 

 course with the Mauritius and the Isle of Bourbon, that 

 it seems improbable that a noxious insect should pass 

 from one country to the other. On the other hand these 

 two islands are in frequent communication with Hindo- 

 stan and China, and import at the present day many Coo- 

 lies therefrom. BruUe also considers the American na- 

 tivity of this insect as very problematical. (HUt. Nat. 

 Ins. IX. p. 33.) I have never met with it in Illinois and 

 do not believe that it exists there. Our common Coclt- 

 roaches, which do not however occur in houses but only 

 in the woodlands, arc Platamodea pcnnsyl oanica DeG. ami 

 PI. unicolor Scudd., which last species has been errone- 

 ously described by Mr. Scuddcr as only one half of its 

 actual size. Both of these occur also in similar situations 

 on the seabord of the Eastern States, and in the houses 

 there the imported Blatta orientalis Fisch., which is such 

 a pest in European houses. 



than that which we are accustomed to call the Old 

 World. Our plants and our animals mostly belong 

 to an old-fashioned antediluvian creation, not so 

 highly improved and developed as the more modern- 

 ized creation which exists in Europe. Consequent- 

 ly they can no more stand their ground against Eu- 

 ropean competitors imported from abroad, than the 

 Red Indian has been able to stand his ground 

 against the White Caucasian race. On the other 

 hand, if by chance an American plant or an Ame- 

 rican animal finds its way to Europe, it can, as a 

 general rule, no more stand its ground there against 

 its European competitors, than a colony of Red 

 Indians could stand their ground in England, even 

 if you gave them a whole county of land and a 

 hundred shiploads of stock, tools and provisions to 

 begin with. I refer hero, of course, only to what 

 is called the naturalization of a plant or an animal, 

 i. e. its becoming able permanently to maintain it- 

 self in a state of nature in any particular country. 

 For there are plenty of American plants and ani- 

 mals, which are artificially domesticated in Europe, 

 the Potato and the Turkey for example. But-who 

 ever heard of Potatoes and Turkeys running wild 

 in Europe, as the European Horse has run wild in 

 Mexico, and the European Cow in Buenos Ayres, 

 or as the European purslane has spread over every 

 garden and field in the United States ? 



Let not " Young America," however, be discou- 

 raged and disgusted at hearing, that^-our Animal 

 and Vegetable Creation is more old-fashioned than 

 that of what is commonly known as the Old World. 

 There is a large Continent, which is as much more 

 old-fashioned than America in its plantsand animals, 

 as America is more old-fashioned than the so-called 

 .\ncient Continents. In America we have but a 

 single mammal — ^the opossum — that brings forth its 

 young before they are fully developed, and carries 

 them about with it in a pouch, till they are ready 

 to be born again in a complete state of develop- 

 ment. In the Old World they have none at all. 

 In Australia almost all their mammals possess this 

 remarkable peculiarity, which characterizes the 

 first and earliest mammals that are known to have 

 existed in ancient geological times; and in addition 

 they actually have a mammal — the Ornithorhyncus 

 — that has a bill like a duck and lays eggs like a duck, 

 thus forming a degraded type connecting the Mam- 

 mals with the Birds. If Europe crows over us, we 

 can crow over Australia. If the American crea- 

 tion is old-fogyish, that of Australia is more old-fo- 

 gyish still. 



When accounts arrived in Europe, towards the 

 close of the last Century, of the frightful manner in 

 which the Hessian Fly was destroying the Wheat 

 crop in the United States, the British Government 

 was so greatly alarmed at the idea of its being im- 

 ported from America into England, that they actu- 

 ally called a special Meeting of the Privy Council, 

 to deliberate on the best and most advisable means 

 of excluding the little pest. They need not have 

 alarmed themselves at all about the matter. It is 

 now clearly proved, that the Hessian Fly has exist- 

 ed time immemorial in Europe, but in such limited 



