80 



THE AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



bage-bug iStrachia histrionica, Hahn, Fig. 

 5G), so called from the gay theatrical Harlequiii- 

 likc manner in which the black and yellow col- 

 ors are ai'rangcd upon its body. Tlie first 

 account of the operations of this very pretty but 

 unfortunately very mischievous bug appeai-ed 

 in the year 1866 from the able pea of Dr. Gid- 

 eon Lincccum, of Washington county, Texas, 

 and were printed in tlie Practical Entomologist 

 (Vol. I, p. 110). His remarks are to the fol- 

 lowing efl'ect: 



Tlie year before last they got into my garden, 

 and utterly destroyed my cabbage, radishes, 

 mnsiard, seed turnips, and every other cruci- 

 form plant. Last year I did not set any of that 

 Oiilir of plants in my garden. But the present 

 year, tliinking they had probably left the pre- 

 iriises, I planted my garden with radishes, mus- 

 tard, and a varietyof cabbages. By the fir^t of 

 April the mustard and radishes were lai'ge 

 enough for use, and I discovered that the insect 

 had commenced on them. 1 began picking 

 them oft" by hand and tramping them under 

 foot. By that means I have preserved my 43-1: 

 cabbages, but I have visited every one of them 

 daily now for four months, finding on them 

 from thirty-live to sixty full-grown insects 

 every day, "some coupled and some in the act of 

 depositing their eggs. Although many have 

 been hatched in my garden the present season, 

 I have suffered none to come to maturity ; and 

 the daily supplies of grown insects that I have 

 been blessed with, are immigrants from some 

 other garden. 



The perfect insect lives through the winter, 

 and is ready to deposit its eggs as early as the 

 loth of March, or sooner, if it finds any cruciform 

 plant large enough. They set their eggs ou 

 end in two rows, cemented together, mostly on 

 the underside of the leaf, and generally from 

 eleven to twelve in number. In about six days 

 in April — four days in July— there hatches out 

 from these eggs a brood of larvfe resembling the 

 perfect insect, except in having no wings. This 

 brood immediately begins the work of destruc- 

 tion by piercing and sucking the life-sap from 

 the leaves; and in twelve days they have ma- 

 tured. They are timid, and will run ofT and 

 hide behind" the first leaf-stem, or any part of 

 the plant that will answer the purpose. The 

 leaf that they puncture immediately wilts, like 

 the effects of poison, and soon withers. Half a 

 dozen grown insects will kill a cabbage in a 

 day. They continue through the summer, and 

 sufficient perfect insects survive the winter to 

 insure a full crop of them for the coming season. 



This tribe of insects do not seem liable to the 

 attacks of any of the cannibal races, either in 

 the egg state or at any other stage. Our birds 

 pay no attention to them, neither will the do- 

 mestic fowls touch them. I have, as yet, found 

 no way to get clear of them, but to pick them 

 oft' by hand. 



It appears from this statement that there are 

 at least two broods of the species every year, 

 the first hatching out in April and the second 

 in July ; and as it is said that only 16 or 18 days 



elapse from the deposition of the egg to the 

 mature development of the perfect bug, it is not 

 improbable that the species is in reality many- 

 brooded. The eggs, of which we have speci- 

 mens now before us, are about 0.03 inch in 

 diameter, barrel-shaped, and of a greenish-white 

 color with two broad black bands encircling the 

 staves of the barrel so as to look exactly like 

 hoops. To afford a passage to the young larva, 

 one of the heads of the barrel — the one, of course, 

 that is not glued to the surfsice of the leaf— is 

 detached by the beak of the little stranger as 

 neatly and as smoothly as if a skillful cooper 

 had beeu at work on it with his hammer and 

 driver. And yet, instead of employing years in 

 acquiring the necessary skill, the mechanic that 

 performs this delicate operation with unerring 

 precision, is actually not as yet born into this 

 sublunary world ! 



Hitherto it had been generally supposed by 

 entomologists that the Harlequin Cabbage-bug 

 was confined to the most southerly of the South- 

 ern States, such as Texas and Louisiana; and 

 it had consequently been called by some " the 

 Texan Cabbage-bug," instead of translating the 

 scientific name and calling it, as we have done, 

 "the Harlequin Cabbage-bug." In September, 

 18G7, however, we received numerous living 

 specimens from Dr. Summerer, of Salisbury, in 

 North Carolina; and from his account it seems 

 to be as great a pest in the gardens of that State 

 as Dr. Lincecum describes it to be in Texas. 

 Hence the species is most probaby to be met 

 with, in particular localities and in particular 

 seasons, throughout the Southern States, at 

 least as far north as Tennessee and Arkansas; 

 and we should not be surprised if a few spe- 

 cimens were eventually to turn up in Southern 

 Illinois, and in Southern Missouri. 



It is said that no criminal among the human 

 race is so vile and depraved, that not one single 

 redeeming feature can be discovered in his char- 

 acter. It is just so with this insect. Unlike the 

 great majority of the extensive group (Scutel- 

 lera Family, Order of Half-winged Bugs) to 

 which it belongs, it has no unsavory bedbuggy 

 smell, but on the contrary exhales a faint odor 

 which is rather pleasant than otherwise. We 

 have already referred to the beauty of its color- 

 ing. As offsets, therefore, to its greediness and 

 its thievery, we have, first the fact of its being 

 agreeable to the nose, and secondly the fact of 

 its being agreeable to the eye. Are there not 

 certain demons in the garb of angels, occasion- 

 ally to be met with among the human species, 

 in favor of whom no stronger arguments than 

 the above can possibly be urged? 



