HOW TO GROW GOOD CORN. 197 



be correct, there is the enormous quantity of 4G8,0001b., or 209 tons, 

 of worms, insects, and their larvse, destroyed by the rooks of a single 

 rookery in one year. To everyone who knows how very destructive 

 to vegetation are the larvae of the tribes of insects, as well as worms, 

 fed upon by rooks, some slight idea may be formed of the devastation 

 which rooks are the means of preventing." 



Let this, then, suffice for the rooks ; but starlings, 

 wagtails, larks, and other birds, are also helpmates to 

 the farmer ; and therefore the wanton destruction of 

 these will certainly bring, nay, has already brought, 

 a great amount of trouble upon the cultivator of the 

 soil. 



The destruction we speak of has been committed 

 by clubs and societies established for the purpose; 

 but, as their members are mostly filled up with all 

 sorts of prejudices — few being naturalists, or even ac- 

 curate observers — it becomes daily a matter of more 

 pressing importance that middle-class education, if 

 not National-school teaching, should recognise the 

 value of the natural sciences. 



2. The Gout-fly (Chlor ops glabra) and the Saw-fly 

 {Sir ex pygmceus) both lay their eggs below the first 

 node or knot of the young plant, which, as soon as 

 they hatch, form maggots that eat out the substance 

 of the stems and the nodes, which thus become weak- 

 ened and ultimately break off, or, if left standing, the 

 ears of corn as they appear will be dried, whitened, 

 and infertile. 



In these, as in most cases of insect attacks, we 

 have an occasional blight of such extent as to destroy 

 whole crops, against which we are almost powerless, 

 as we know so little of the economy of the creatures 

 by whom the mischief is caused ; still, there can be 



