ORDER IV. MOTHS AND BUTTERFLIES. 183 



operations, the result of which is very surprising. Place 

 some of these caterpillars, or moths, in a large glass vessel 

 covered with gauze, and provide them with a certain quan- 

 tity of beeswax as food, and after the wax is consumed 

 they will eat paper, dried leaves, and even woolen cloth, 

 but only after they have eaten, digested, and several times 

 re-eaten their excrements, which after many digestions will 

 be reduced to a black dust, from which they afterward fab- 

 ricate tunnels. In this manner they will go through their 

 various metamorphoses, multiplying for several years in the 

 glass vessel, without requiring any care or new supply of 

 food. 



These moths are not natives of America, but, like the 

 bees upon whose products they live, were originally foreign 

 emigrants from Europe. But as the bees, in spite of their 

 foreign origin, and the venomous sting they bring with them 

 to defend themselves against their assailants, have, by their 

 great practical utility and long residence here, become natu- 

 ralized citizens, so we may reckon the moths and their 

 caterpillars as among our own injurious insects, which de- 

 serve to be destroyed by any means in our power. 



In Dr. Thatcher's " Treatise on the Management of 

 Bees," there are several ways mentioned by which we may 

 get rid of this pest of the bee-hive. But the most conven- 

 ient and least troublesome method of preventing the bee- 

 moth from entering the hive is to place shallow basins, filled 

 with water mixed with vinegar, and sweetened with honey, 

 sugar, or molasses, near the entrance to the bee-hive, and 

 this should be done early in the evening, as soon as the bees 

 have gone to rest. This, too, is the time when the bee- 

 moths are flying about seeking a place to deposit their eggs, 

 and as they are very fond of sweets, a great number of them 

 will be drowned. 



