Lauinus.- 



-INSECTS.- 



-Cryptorhvnchid.e. 



229 



tus often occasions much damage to the gardener by 

 destroying plants in pots. Mr. Westwood and the 

 late Mr. Haworth founil th!s insect in the mouth of 



Fig. 122. 



KlyiruniB atrattis. 



December, at the roots of plants in pots at a short 

 distance below the surface, where they gnawed round 

 the upper part of the root, leaving the lower parts and 

 the leaves and stems untouched. They enter into the 

 pupa state in the beginning of summer, and soon emerge 

 as beetles. The larva is clothed with numerous short, 

 rigid hairs. 



Another destructive species is the Oliorhynchus 

 picipes, aninsect, like most of its congeners, so like 

 the soil in colour, that when it does not move, or lies 

 with its limbs contracted, it requires a very sharp eye 

 to distinguish it from the ground. This Weevil is at 

 times a dreadful pest in gardens, from the ravages it 

 commits on vines in hothouses and on wall-fruit during 

 tlie night. These ravages are caused by their feeding 

 on the young shoots. In spring they injure raspberry 

 plants by eating through the flowering stems and leaves, 

 and as early as February or March they attack the bark 

 and buds of apple and pear trees. 



Of the group Ei-irliinidce there are ninety-two re- 

 corded British species in the foUowing genera : — 



Lixus, with its host of narrow species, mostly exotic. 

 The beautiful L. blcolor is found at Deal ; Lariniis, 

 with one British species; lihinocyllus, Pissodes, con- 

 fined to northern parts, where the species P. Nutatus 

 is often very destructive to the pine forests; May- 

 dalinus and Erirhinus. One is named E. vorux, pro- 

 bably because it does much damage. Gri/pidius, 

 Hydronomus, Etleschus, and Brachonyx ; Antho- 

 numus Balaniiius {Bidanimis nucum is the common Nut- 

 weevil); Ainalus, Tychius, Miccolrogus, Sinicronyx, 

 Sihynes, and Orchestes. 



Daniel Haubury, Esq., in the Proceedings of the Lin- 

 na;an Society for May, 1859, has figured a curious insect 

 product, the cocoon of the Larimis macuhitus. These 

 cocoons are called Treliala or Tricali by the Turks. 

 They are constructed by the weevil on a species of 

 Echiiiops ; they form "the basis of a mucilaginous 

 drink administered to the sick," and enjoy in con- 

 sequence some celebrity in the Kast. They are of an 

 oval or round form, and about three-quarters of an inch 

 in length ; outside is a rough, tuberculated coating 

 of a greyish-white colour, looking like earth or ashes 

 held together with gum. These cocoons, according to 

 M. tiiiibourt, are composed " of a large proportion of 



starch, gum of a peculiar saccharine matter, a bitter 

 principle, besides earthy and alkaline salts." — {Hau- 

 bury, 1. c, p. 181.) 



M. Bourlier says that, in Constantinople, the Jew 

 drug-dealers keep great quantities of the Treliala, and 

 that " it is frequently used by the Arab and Turkish 

 physicians in the form of a decoction, which is regarded 

 by them as of peculiar efficacy in diseases of the respira- 

 tory organs. 



Fig. 123. 



Fig. 123 shows the Larinus mdh'fims of Jekel, a 

 species, like the former, said to secrete a saccharine 

 substance resembling dark honey. 



The group Baridiida is an immense group of 

 weevils, often very beautifully metallic. In Britain 

 onl}' five species are found. There must be at least 

 between four and five hundred species in the Bow- 

 ringian collection. 



The group CrypiorhyncJuda; so called from the 

 beak being capable of withdrawal into a groove on the 

 breast, contains eighty-three British species in fourteen 

 genera, the most numerous of which in species aie 

 Ccdiodes, Bagoils, and Ceutorhyrtchiia. On Plate 4, 

 fig. 10, is figured a fine Brazilian species of the group 

 named Ameris Dufresnii — Kirby giving it the specific 

 name in compliment to a French naturalist, wlio sold 

 his collections to the Edinburgh College Museum. We 

 figure here the strange and rare Hyhomorphus atratus, 

 described by M. Henri Jtkcl, and which looks liker 

 one of the Ileteromera than a weevil (fig. 124). It is 

 from Lord Howe's Island. 



Fig. 124. 



Hybomoi'pliiis atraUis. 



The other cut (fig. 125) represents the curious Tachj- 

 opus Leconlei, a small beetle about a line and a tliird 

 long. It lives on oaks in South Cartlina, on the under 

 sde of leaves, where it was.found by Dr. Zimmerman, 

 who says they feign death. They fix themselves to the 



