NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 253 



LETTER LIII. 



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 recollecting what 

 I have heard and read concerning the Coccus vitis viniferce 

 of Linnaeus, which, in the south of Europe, infests many 

 vines, and is a 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 

 tvith 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 imme- 

 diately under my study-window, where I usually kept my 

 specimens. True it is that I had received nothing from 

 thence for some years : but as insects, we know, are 



