LETTER LIII 



TO THE SAME 



As I have sometimes known you make inquiries about 

 several kinds of insects, I shall here send you an account 

 of one sort which I little expected to have found in this 

 kingdom. I had often observed that one particular part of 

 a vine growing on the walls of my house was covered in 

 the autumn with a black dust-like appearance, on which 

 the flies fed eagerly ; and that the shoots and leaves thus 

 affected did not thrive ; nor did the fruit ripen. To this 

 substance I applied my glasses ; but could not discover 

 that it had anything to do with animal life, as I at first 

 expected : but, upon a closer examination behind the larger 

 boughs, we were surprised to find that they were coated 

 over with husky shells, from whose sides proceeded a cotton- 

 like substance, surrounding a multitude of eggs. This 

 curious and uncommon production put me upon recol- 

 lecting what I have heard and read concerning the coccus 

 vitis vinifera of Linnaus, which, in the south of Europe, 

 infests many vines, and is an horrid and loathsome pest. 

 As soon as I had turned to the accounts given of this 

 insect, I saw at once that it swarmed on my vine ; and did 

 not appear to have been at all checked by the preceding 

 winter, which had been uncommonly severe. 



Not being then at all aware that it had anything to do 

 with England, I was much inclined to think that it came 

 from Gibraltar among the many boxes and packages of 

 plants and birds which I had formerly received from thence ; 

 and especially as the vine infested grew immediately under 



my study-window, where I usually kept my specimens. 



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