84 DR. HARRIS'S REPORT. April, 



weight. It is not confined to rice, but also attacks maize. I have 

 seen stored maize literally alive with them ; and should the evil be 

 propagated and extended in this section of our country, it will prove 

 a serious injury to one of our most valuable staple productions. 



The insect inserts only a single egg in each grain, but, as she is 

 very prolific, one female may produce a numerous progeny. The 

 eggs are deposited when the grain begins to swell, and while it is 

 yet very tender. The maggot lives securely and unsuspected in 

 the centre of the rice ; when it has attained its full size it has formed 

 a cavity from which it gnaws a small passage through one end, which 

 it stops up with some of the flour or particles of the rice, and then be- 

 comes a pupa, and subsequently a perfect insect before leaving its hab- 

 itation, which takes place in the spring. This weevil does not, to my 

 knowledge, attack rice or maize after it has become dried and is stored 

 for consumption. The wheat weevil of this country is unknown to 

 me. I have a large species of Calandra which I am informed was 

 found in southern maize, and which has continued to be propagated 

 in the corn-house where it was first introduced. 



The family of wood-eaters or Xylophages, called also Bostricidce, 

 includes the notorious Scolytus Pyri^ and many other insects which 

 feed upon wood. When these abound, they are productive of much 

 mischief, particularly in forests, which are often greatly injured by 

 them, and the wood rendered unfit for the purposes of art. In the 

 year 1780, an insect of this family made its appearance in the pine 

 trees of one of the mining districts of Germany. Three years af- 

 terwards whole forests had disappeared, and for want of fuel, an end 

 was nearly put to the working of the extensive mines in this range of 

 country. 



A distinguished British naturalist, in the year 1824, was requested 

 to investigate the cause of an alarming decay of the noble elms which 

 ornament St. James' and Hyde Parks. He discovered that they were 

 infested by numerous insects belonging to the genus Scolytus, whose 

 ravages had loosened the bark of many of the trees, causing it to fall 

 off in large flakes, and threatening their total destruction. An abstract 

 of the account given by Mr. Macleay, the naturalist just mentioned, 

 and some additional information on destructive insects, was published, 

 with the signature of Indagator, in the fifth volume of the New Eng- 



