218 INSECTS AND MAN 



to bite their warts, and during the process a black fluid is 

 emitted from the mouth of the grasshopper which is sup- 

 posed to possess the power of destroying the excrescences. 

 The exuviae of the Semni grasshopper are preserved and 

 sold for medicinal use in China and Japan. A drug called 

 locusteum was prepared by Dr J. M. Honigberger, by tri- 

 turating the bodies of Locusta migratoria, minus head, 

 wings, and legs, into a paste and then adding proof spirit. 

 It was recommended for haemorrhoids and thirst. 



The gall flies, belonging to the order Hymenoptera, or 

 membrane-winged insects, furnish galls rich in tannin, and 

 much used in the arts and in medicine. The female of 

 Cynips gallce tinctorice lays its eggs in the tissue of the 

 leaf of an oak, Quercus infectoria, injecting with each 

 egg a fluid which causes a tumour to arise on the leaf to 

 serve as a shelter for the future larva and pupa till trans- 

 formed into a gall fly, when it eats its way out. The best 

 oak galls come from the Levant, and they are strongly 

 astringent. Another gall fly, Cynips rosce, produces galls 

 on rose trees. These galls, called Bedeguar, are successfully 

 used as remedies against diarrhoea and dysentery, and are 

 also reported to be of use in cases of stone, scurvy, and 

 worms. 



The old Spiritus formicarum of the Prussian pharmaco- 

 poeia was prepared by macerating two parts of bruised ants 

 in three parts of alcohol, thereby extracting the active 

 principle of the insects known as formic acid. Ants found 

 in the wood of pine trees are eaten by the lumbermen of 

 Maine as an anti-scorbutic, it is said with good effect. 

 Schroeder prescribed preparations of ants which he called 

 Formica minor for leprosy and an infusion of Formica 

 major for gout and palsy. In Thuringia a spirit of ants 

 is rubbed into the affected parts in cases of rheumatism ; 

 whilst, in Russia, a successful remedy for the same com- 

 plaint is a vapour bath, prepared by pouring boiling water 

 over ants, thus setting free the formic acid. 



