INSECT ENEMIES. 233 



yielding, and he determined to let tlie crop stand a little 

 longer. His neighbours all believed that he was losing 

 time ; but a few days showed that he was perfectly right ; 

 and the result is, that he has an abundant crop, the beans 

 in general being large and well coloured, with a small 

 admixture of blotched or speckled individuals. An ordi- 

 nary cultivator would undoubtedly have followed the ex- 

 ample of others. This is but one amongst hundreds 

 of examples which prove the necessity of close observa- 

 tion in agricultural and horticultural pursuits, where 

 it is too often utterly neglected.'' 



The insect enemies to the bean crop, and their mode of 

 attack, are far better known to us than the diseases to 

 which it is liable. No sooner is the seed-bean placed in the 

 ground, and the process of germination fairly commenced, 

 than a "millepede," or false wireworm (see fig. p. 74), seeks 

 it out, and commences its operations by eating into the 

 substance of the bean, and thus either destroying the seed 

 at once, or so injuring it as to render it capable of pro- 

 ducing only a sickly and debilitated offspring, which either 

 falls before the first frost that visits the surface, or lingers 

 on a little longer, to become the prey of disease, or of other 

 insects that visit the plant at a later period of its growth. 

 The " millepedes" generally met with thus attacking the 

 seed, are the lulus pulchellus, and the Polydesmus com- 

 planatus. Those plants which thrive, and are fortunate 

 enough to escape uninjured by them, are liable, as soon as 

 they appear above the ground, to be attacked by the 

 "Bean Weevils/' the Sitona lineata and the Otiorhynchus 

 picipes. These are in appearance like very minute beetles, 

 of a dark ochreous colour, very much resembling the soil, 

 in which they take refuge during the night, or whenever 

 they are disturbed during the day time, so that, unless 

 detected while at work on the plant itself, it is impossible 

 to discover them. They commence their attacks with the 



