234- INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



incredible injury, especially if they are not kept dry and 

 well aired a . Of the devastation committed by Galleria 

 Mellonella in our bee-hives I have before given you an 

 account : to this I must here add, that if it cannot come 

 at wax, it will content itself with woollen cloth, leather, 

 or even paper b . Mr. Curtis found the grub of a beetle 

 (Ptinus Fur] in an old coat, which it devoured, making 

 holes and channels in it ; and another insect of the same 

 order (Megatoma Pellio\ Linne tells us, will sometimes 

 entirely strip a fur garment of its hair c . A small beetle 

 of the Capricorn tribe (Callidium pygmaum} I have good 

 reason to believe devours leather, since I have found it 

 abundant in old shoes. 



Next to our garments our houses and buildings, which 

 shelter us and our property from the inclemency and in- 

 juries of the atmosphere, are of consequence to us: yet 

 these, solid and substantial as they appear, are not se- 

 cure from the attack of insects ; and even our furniture 

 often suffers from them. A great part of our comfort 

 within doors depends upon our apartments being kept 

 clean and neat. Spiders by their webs, which they sus- 

 pend in every angle, and flies by their excrements, which 

 they scatter indiscriminately upon every thing, interfere 

 with this comfort, and add much to the business of our 

 servants. Even ants will sometimes plant their colonies 

 in our kitchens, (I have known the horse-ant, Formica 

 rufa, do this,) and are not easily expelled. Those of Sierra 

 Leone, as I was once informed by the learned Professor 

 Afzelius, make their way by millions through the houses. 

 They resolutely pursue a straight course ; and neither 

 buildings nor rivers, even though myriads perish in the 



a Reaum. iii. 42. b Ibid. 257. e Amoen, Acad. iii. 346. 



