240 



they lengthen and widen as they grow: They cover 

 them with gross matter, and frequently with their ex- 

 crements. They construct those galleries on the various 

 bodies they feed upon, and which differ .according to 

 the species of the insect. The name of false motks has 

 been given to all such species as make those enclosures. 

 You are sensible,, that those of true moths are portable. 

 The most remarkable false moths are such as settle in 

 bee-hives, and destroy the combs. They are without 

 defensive arms, and are only secured with a soft and de- 

 licate skin; notwithstanding which nature has appointed 

 them to live at the expence of a little warlike people 

 that are well-armed, and equally well disposed to de- 

 fend their settlements. Our engineers have frequently 

 recourse to mines and saps in the reduction of places. 

 Jt is indeed abundantly necrs^ary that our false moth* 

 should excel in this kind of attack, and their works 

 prove that they do. They never march but under cover. 

 They scoop long trenches in the thick part of the combs, 

 in what direction they think proper, wherein they are 

 always in safety from the enemy. The galleries or this 

 kind are lined within with a very close silk tissue, and 

 covered on the outside with a thick layer of grains of 

 wax and excrements. Thus the fine works of the la- 

 borious bees are destroyed in silence by an enemy which 

 they are not able to discover, and that sometimes com- 

 pels them to abandon their hive. The false moths have 

 no intention to procure honey : they never penetrate 

 into the cells that contain it, They only eat the wax, 

 and their stomach analyses the matter which the chymist 

 cannot dissolve. When they have attained their full 

 growth, they make a silk cone at the end of the gallery, 

 which they never fail to cover with grains of wax. 



Other false moths establish themselves in our gra- 

 naries, where they multiply excessively. They covet 

 our most valuable commodity. They connect together 

 several grains of corn j they spin a little tube in the 

 midst of this heap, where they lodge. By that means 

 they are always within reach of a. plentiful stock of 



