﻿OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



by the fumes from the scalded insects, that it is surprising that Prof. 

 Burrill should have so stoutly assumed the negative of the question 

 without further research and experiment. It is as if I, who am not 

 affected by poison ivy or bee sting, should insist on the harmlessness 

 of either, in the face of their well known poisonous qualities, and 

 their danger to many persons, I know of physicians who persist in 

 disbelieving that death was ever caused by calubrine poison because 

 they have never known a fatal case of snake-bite in their own expe- 

 rience; but skepticism of that which is outside one's own experience 

 usually dwells most where that experience is limited. Since my 

 acquaintance with the Colorado Potato-beetle, three cases of its poi- 

 sonous influence have been reported to me by persons in whose judg- 

 ment and veracity I have the utmost confidence,* and without for a 

 moment doubting the facts Prof. Burrill has recorded, which are valu- 

 able as far as they go, I would simply say that they do not go far enough, 

 and he has not solved the whole truth of the matter. That the juices 

 of the mashed insects on the human skin are, as a rule, harmless, is 

 proven by the hosts of farmers who have crushed them by hand, and 

 1 can testify to the fact from my own experience ; indeed, scarcely any 

 one who has had experience believes the wild stories of the poison- 

 ous nature of these juices. Yet the rule is not without exceptions, 

 and I do not doubt that, with blood in certain bad conditions, persons 

 have been poisoned by getting said juices into wounds or cuts. But 

 the cases of undoubted poisoning from this insect — cases that have in 

 some instances been serious and even proved fatal — are not from the 

 juices of the body, but from the hniising or crushing of large masses, 

 especially by burning or scalding large quantities at a time. The 

 poison seems to be of a very volatile nature, and to produce swelling, 



*Even since this Avas written, and just as this Report is going to press, the following letter, under 

 date of March 15, 1875, came to hand : "On June 1st, 1S74, I was called to see a little boy, son of Mr. 

 E. H. Torgis, residing in a little village about two miles from this city. I found the child unwilling to 

 speak, with jactitation, quick breathing, florid condition of the skin, spitting viscid, frothy phlegm; at 

 times a quick, rather rapid ]iulsc, and shortly after my arrival a peculiar spasm. The case was puzzling 

 to me, but that it was a case of poisoning froin some source suggested itself at once. I made diligent 

 iuquiiy into the case, and eventually the father desci'ibed to me the manner in which the boy would 

 gather his apron full of potato bugs and sit down by a flat stone and by the means of another stone 

 would mash them one at a time. Of course, in so doing he inhaled the volatile properties of the insects' 

 juices. The case was antidoted by the proper antidotes for such a case with marked results. On my 

 second visit made in the evening, I found the face the same in appearance, but the temperature of the 

 skin markedly diflerent ; the jaws were slightly relaxed and there was high fever. I then paid some 

 attention to these symptoms, and after making three more visits discharged the case. Another case 

 came to my notice. It was that of a farmer's wife who was in the habit of daily gathering the bugs and 

 scalding or burning them. She was seized with swelling in the hands, burning in the stomach and dis- 

 tension of the abdomen. I attributed it to the same cause, and relieved it accordingly. I also saw two 

 other cases somewhat similar, and from these observations am most thoroughly convinced that the insect 

 is poisonous. -J. H. FISHBURNE, M. D. 



Lock Havex, Pa. 



