THE GREENFLY. 95 



saults on the citidel of the carnation's life. Professor Theodore 

 Woods, of the United States Agricultural Department says : 



''There is not a plant or tree, wild or cultivated, that escapes 

 the ravages of this pest, and of all the beings that rank under the 

 head of injurious insects there is not one capable of causing more 

 distruction than the Greenfly." 



Both the primary and secondary effect of the piercings of an 

 Aphid makes it the carnation's greatest enemy, its powers of mul- 

 tiplication are so enormously rapid, that, abetted by the Locust and 

 San Jose scale, if they were not restrained by destructive enemies 

 of their own, would soon denude the world of vegetation. Like 

 the barbarians from the northern hive that overran and destroyed 

 Roman civilization in the fifth century, the Aphides feed upon 

 everything that floats the plasm of vegetable life. Entomologists 

 say its most delectable menu is the rich blood of the Dianthus 

 genus of plants. 



This insect is too well known to 

 need any description. It multiplies by 

 agamic reproduction. Little cells, or 

 nodes develop on the inner walls of 

 the parent's abdomen, which are rapid- 

 ly detached, and in a few hours are de- 

 livered by its parent as live Aphides. 

 Remeur estimates that one Aphid may 

 be the progenitor of 6,000,000 lineal 

 descendants in a single season. They 

 breathe through openings in their An Aphid, highly magnified, 

 sides. Some of their offspring have wings so they may more easily 

 scatter their countless numbers. Their mode of continuing their 

 species is an exact duplication of continuing carnations by cuttings. 

 It is recommended to the consideration of advocates of the running- 

 out theory. Long years of agamic life has entailed no degeneracy 

 on the Greenfly. It is as virile today as when its first parent thrust 

 its proboscis into the protoplasm of a dianthus leaf. The voracity 

 of the Greenfly is only equaled by its prodigous geometrical powers 

 of multiplication They feed like vampires on the vegetable 



