SELDOM OBSERVED. 119 



proper check to their increase. " I fear," says 

 Mr. Curtis, *' the ingenuity of man will never 

 devise any method for the destruction of this 

 little ' rogue in grain' when once he has taken 

 possession of a standing crop." Professor 

 Henslow likewise remarks, " The researches 

 which I have made on the subject since my 

 report was written, have satisfied me that the 

 damage done by this minute insect is much 

 greater than agricuUurists are at all aware of." 

 The author can assert, that in the autumn of 

 1845, he found great quantities of the larvse 

 not only in a first-rate wheat district in Nor- 

 folk, but in other parts of the country. Ear 

 after ear was gathered by him, examined, and 

 the contents shown to farmers who never be- 

 fore had even heard of such things, and who 

 were perfectly astonished Avhen they saw them. 

 Often has he also entered a barn and taken up 

 a handful of dust from the floor where wheat 

 has been winnowed, turned out the httle orange- 

 coloured devourers, now in their membranous 

 cases, one after another, but scarcely ever met 

 with any person who had previously noticed 

 them. If they had seen them, they took them 

 for the seeds of some kind of weed. There 

 seems also to be good reason to suppose that 



