516 Select Plants for Industrial Culture and 



according to late accounts one-third of all the vineyards of France 

 were affected, and the disease is also spreading in Italy, Spain, 

 Germany, Austria, Hungary, Algeria, Syria and South-Africa. 

 The most effectual method of combating this enemy in France has 

 been fouud in grafting the ordinary grape-vine on stocks of several 

 American species of Vitis. It may be worthy of trial, how far the 

 grape-vine can be grafted on such other species, not American, as 

 may not be attacked by the Phylloxera. Professor Moimier, of 

 Geneva, has introduced the very expansive sulphurous anhydrous 

 acid gas against the Phylloxera. The cultivation of insecticidal 

 herbs, to check the ingress of Phylloxera, should be more exten- 

 sively tried, as such plants might ward off the insect at all events 

 in its wingless state. Dr. Herman Behr suggests for the mitiga- 

 tion of this plague the ignition of wood near vineyards, when the 

 insect is on its wings, as all such insects seek fires, and succumb in 

 them largely, the attraction to the fiery light being greatest when 

 the sky is overcast, or when the nights are without moonlight. Mr. 

 Leacock, in Madeira, applies a coating of a sticky solution of resin 

 in oil of turpentine advantageously to the roots of Vines affected 

 by Phylloxera. Dr. Clemm extols an application of easily decom- 

 posed carbonates or sulphids to the soil with subsequent addition 

 of any diluted acid, whereby the suffocating carbonic acid gas or the 

 sulphuret of hydrogen is formed and liberated, the resulting salts 

 in their turn to reinvigorate and nourish the suffering plant 

 [Dr. G. Krause]. Successive broods of Phylloxera maintained 

 their vitality on remnants of Vine-roots for six years and more. 

 Inundation to the depth of a few inches for about a month, where 

 that is practicable, completely suffocates the Phylloxera, but 

 renders the vine for a while much less productive. In sandy soil 

 this dreadful insect is retarded in its development, action and 

 progress. Bisulphide of carbon has proved an efficient remedy : 

 this expansive fluid is introduced into the soil by a peculiar iujee- 

 tor or through porous substances (wood, earth), saturated with the 

 bisulphide, the cost of this operation being, in France, 3 10s. -4 

 per acre annually. [Planchon, David, Marion, Robart. See also 

 translations by K. Staiger and A. K. Findlay.] Dressing with 

 sulpho-carbonate of potassium is still more efficacious and less 

 dangerous, but involves an annual expenditure of about 8 

 per acre [W. T. Dyer]. Sand might be dug in at the roots of 

 vines, which may be in imminent danger of becoming a prey of 

 Phylloxera. Recently io has been insisted on by Mr. Bauer, of 

 San Francisco, that it would be best to put minute quantities 

 of mercury, triturated with chalk, near the roots of vines affected 

 with Phylloxera, a measure which deserves every consideration, as 

 the particles of quicksilver would only very gradually become 

 dissolved, and long remain stationary ; and we know that metal in 

 its solutions to be the most powerful antiseptic, a dilution of one 

 part of bichloride of mercury in 5,000 parts of water proving 

 strong enough for surgical purposes, It is reported from Califor- 

 nia likewise, that there cereals seem also attacked by Phylloxera 



