BENEFICIAL INSECTS 217 



reported that, if several of the larvae were crushed between 

 the fingers until sufficient oil had been absorbed, any aching 

 tooth touched with an anointed finger would be relieved of 

 pain. About the same period other weevils were used by 

 the Tuscan peasants against toothache. 



The only other beetle that appears to have been used 

 medicinally is a musk beetle, Aromia moschata, which, 

 when dried and powdered, forms a vesicatory as efficient 

 as cantharides. 



Of the earwigs, the common Forficula auricularia alone 

 appears to be of remedial value, or supposed value. Oil of 

 earwigs, when rubbed on the temples, wrists, and nostrils, 

 is good to strengthen the nerves. 



The Orthoptera are well represented in entomological 

 Materia Medica. In Russia the common misnamed black 

 beetle, Periplaneta orientalis, has long been used in the 

 form of the powdered insect and in other ways as a 

 remedy for dropsy ; it is known as Tarakane. In other 

 parts of the Continent the powdered, medicinal form of 

 Periplaneta orientalis is sold, under the name of Pulvis 

 Tarakanse, as a remedy for pleurisy and pericarditis ; the 

 American cockroach, Periplaneta americana, is also used 

 in homoaopathy. 



Crickets, according to Pliny, possess many medicinal 

 virtues, mainly in connection with disorders of the ears and 

 throat ; and, in later times, the ashes of the domestic cricket, 

 Gryllus domesticus, have been used in cases of weak sight 

 and enlarged tonsils. 



Although grasshoppers and locusts were used in medicine 

 so long ago as in the time of the ancient Greeks Locusta 

 africana being a noted remedy against scorpion poison, 

 and the eggs of the Chargol locust being carried in the ears 

 of Jewish women as a protection against earache their 

 remedial value has not waned. In Sweden a grasshopper, 

 Tettigonia verrucivwa, is much prized by the native 

 peasants who suffer from warts. They allow the insects 



