98 AMERICAN HOME GARDEN. 



when we may successfully assail it, viz. : a. In the eggs, which, 

 in nests of from ten to a hundred, we may gather by hand, or 

 scrape from the trees on which they are deposited, b. In the 

 chrysales or cocoons, which are often more easily found and 

 gathered than the eggs. c. In the perfect or winged state, by 

 means of fires in their season, d. For those kinds which make 

 nests, the period of weakness immediately succeeding the hatch- 

 ing of the young colony, when they may be crushed at once. We 

 possess also various other means of injuring or destroying them. 

 Upon some we may sow lime or plaster with effect ; others are 

 destroyed by drenching with fatty or soapy matter, which kills 

 them by stopping their breathing-tubes, or with water, which 

 simply drowns them, as the palmer- worm has been found to be 

 destroyed by violent rain. We may gather them by hand, or 

 entrap them with sweets, and in various other ways. But to 

 all this labor there is a limit of wisdom, which it is not worth 

 while to pass. The general principle may be confidently 

 adopted, that only those insects which attack healthy crops and 

 cause disease will repay the trouble of cure or catching. The 

 sole remedy, or rather preventive, for those induced or invited 

 by disease, as the root-worm, the cabbage aphis, the cucumber 

 striped bug, &c., is the preservation of vigor in the crop by 

 timely and suitable culture. In more than thirty years' expe- 

 rience and observation, I have never known a healthy crop of 

 cucumbers materially injured by the striped bug, nor a diseased 

 or checked crop that escaped the bug, or that was restored by 

 the destruction of its supposed destroyer. 



In the following list of insects, all that are injurious to gar- 

 den vegetables in every locality may not be included, but the 

 number inadvertently omitted must be small, and such descrip- 

 tions, and directions, and hints are given in regard to those 

 enumerated as will perhaps furnish aid in reference to others 

 that may have been left out. 



