June 13, 1872] 



NATURE 



133 



M. J. Lichtenstein, a relative, I believe, of the late distinguished 

 Prussian zoologist. These gentlemen, since the first discoveryof the 

 disease in France in 186S, have devoted much of their time to it. 

 Tiiey have compared tlieir observations with tho-e of others wlio in 

 other countries have studied the insect, especially IVIor.s. Laliman, 

 ofBordeaux, Mr. Riley, of Missouri, and with those of Prof. West- 

 wool in our own coun'ry ; and tliey have now, in a pamphlet 

 which, by some inversion of dates not uncommon abroad, is sup- 

 posed to form part of the Proceedings of the session of the French 

 scientific congress at Montpellier in 1S6S, given a /vj7(w/of nearly 

 five hundred memoirs, communications, or journal articles which 

 have been published on the subject up to the close of last year 

 (1S71). 



The main facts given as having been hitherto elicited as proved 

 or probable may be shortly resumed as follows: — 



The Phylloxera, like other Aphides, goes through a number of 

 apterous generations ofa single sex, but multiplying with enormous 

 rapidity ; for one or two individuals will lay as many as five 

 hundred eggs, fertilised without previous copulation. It also 

 gives birth occasionally to a winged generation of both sexes, tlie 

 females of which lay only two or three eggs eacli. 



The apterous Plivlloxcfa is also dimorphous, a smooth bodied 

 form living in little galls formed on the leaves of the vine, where 

 it is comparatively harmless ; and a tuberculate form living in the 

 nodules it produces on the root- fibres, causing first the smaller 

 and then the main roots t > rot, weakening, in the first instance, 

 and finally killing the whole vine. Each form has its winged 

 ganeration. 



The insect is evidently of North American origin, although the 

 precise history of its transmission to this country has not been 

 ascertained. It was first described by Asa Fitch in the Tran- 

 sactions of the New York State Agricultural Society for 1854 ; 

 but living there chiefly on the leaves of the native vines, it had 

 not attracted any peculiar attention. More recently, however, 

 Mr. Riley has found reason to attribute to the ravages of the 

 subterranean form the ill success of the various attempts made to 

 establish in America the European grape-vine. In England, 

 where the introduction of the insect from America may be 

 readily conceived. Prof. Westwood's attention was first called to 

 it in 1863, and again from various quarters in 1S67 and 1868, 

 whence resulted the above-mentioned account in the GarJciier's 

 Chronicle ior January 1S69 (p. 109). With us it does not appear 

 to have spread much, and has therefore not called for any further 

 observation, the damp soil, the mode of treatment, or other 

 external circumstances, proving unfavourable for the development 

 of the underground form. But having by some means reached 

 and established itself in the dry, naturally. drained vineyards of 

 the south of France its general character underwent a change ; 

 natural selection at once gave an enormous preponderance to the 

 underground over the epiphyllous form. It was first discovered 

 therein July i85S, andby the close of that year its ravages caused 

 a panic among the vine-growers in many parts of Lower Lan- 

 guedoc and Provence, similar to that which we may remember 

 in this country oa the rapid spread of the potato disease in 

 the autumn of 1845. It was immediately made the suljject of 

 scientific investigation, which has ever since been steadily pur- 

 sued. As one result Dr. Planchon inclines to believe that the 

 oidium and the potato disease, like the Pliylloxera, and, in former 

 days, the American blight of our apple-trees, had all been im- 

 ported from America. It would seem that all these parasites, 

 whether insects or fungi, capable of enormously rapid and ex- 

 tensive propagation, remain unnoticed so long as they are kept 

 in check by the mutual relations of their constitution, habits, 

 food, and other circumstances in which they are placed ; but that 

 the moment that a change, often very slight, in one or other of 

 these conditions destroys the balance, they may at once and sud- 

 denly gain the upper hand, so as to lie classed in the popular mind 

 amongst those varied ])henomena collectively designed as blights. 

 That such a change is often the consequence of the transportation 

 of the insect from one country to another may be regarded as more 

 probable if Riley is correct in his belief that in America, as in 

 Europe, introduced insects, when once established, are more 

 noxious than indigenous ones. In the case of the Phylloxera 

 some clue to the nature of the influencing alteration may be de- 

 rived from the success attending one of the remedies applied, 

 the inundation and continued submersion of the diseased vine- 

 yards during the winter months. The comparative dryness of 

 the soil in the new over that of the original station of the inject 

 has been the change which natural selection seems to have seized 

 upon to effect the extraordinary development of the underground 

 form, aided, perhaps, by some slight attendant change in its 



constitution. Prolonged, or even temporary inundation, is not 

 however, practicable in the majority of the South of France 

 vineyards, nor, indeed, in any of those producing the best wines, 

 Amongs other remedies, soot (the soot of wood-smoke I presume) 

 promises to be one of the most efficacious applications. 



Amongst the various publications which these phenomena have 

 called forth, we may still see cropping up not unfrequently the 

 popular notion that they are blights mysteriously connected with 

 meteorological conditions, against which it is vain to struggle ; 

 but, fortunately, the need of separately investigating every one 

 of them is becoming generally recognised. In France, Govern- 

 ment has appointed special commissions for inquiries into the silk 

 and wine diseases. In Germany the ravages committed by in- 

 sects on their forests have been the subject of various works, 

 published chiefly under the patronage of the Austrian Govern- 

 ment and scientific associations. In North America Mr. Riley, 

 as Missouri State entomologist, makes .annual reports on noxious 

 insects to the Board of Agriculture of that State, pursuant to an 

 appropriation for this purpose from the Legislature.* In Italy 

 a special institution has been formed at Padua, under official 

 patronage, for the study of cryptogamic parasites ; and our 

 Royal Horticultural Society is also making arrangements for the 

 special encouragement of the study of economic entomology. 

 To these and similar institutions it is the duty of science, in the 

 interest of mankind, to give its unqualified support, to divest 

 itself of all preconceived theories and prejudices, to avoid those 

 polemical discussions which appear to liave gone beyond the 

 security they give for the exhibition of facts in all tlie various 

 points of view they m,ay bear, but impartially to study every 

 detail connected with these scourges, which have so much in- 

 creased during the present century, fostered, perhaps, by the 

 advance of civilisation and high cultivation. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS 



The Litis (No. 2), April, 1S72. — This second number of the 

 new American journal of microscopy contains little that is new 

 or of importance. "The Flora of Chicago and its Vicinity" is 

 continued by H. H. Babcock from the previous number, as is 

 also the " Conspectus of the Families and Genera of the Diato- 

 macea;," by Prof. H. L. Smith. This second part of the Con- 

 spectus is occupied by a " .Synonym Register," which promises 

 to be useful, and is in fact the most complete attempt of the kind 

 yet made. "Microscopical Memoranda for the use of Practi- 

 tioners of Medicine," by Dr. J. J. Woodward, is also a con- 

 tinuation, and consists of two parts, viz., staining the sections, 

 and mounting the stained sections in Canada balsam. There is 

 also a chapter " On the double marking of Triccratiiim,^^ by 

 the same author, accompanied by a Woodbury print of two 

 frustules of Triicratinin funbriatum. "On the effect of the 

 reversal of the current of the Chicago River on the Hydrant 

 Water," by H. II. Babcock. "Where to search for Diato- 

 macea" " is a reprint from the IiiliUalual Observer, and " Alter- 

 nation of generation in Fungi," byM. C. Cooke, from Nature. 

 This number of the Lens is increased to double the thickness of 

 the previous one by the insertion of the catalogue of optical 

 instruments manufactured or sold by an American firm in 

 Philadelphia and New York. 



In the Ameriean Naturalist for April we have an article by 

 Dr. J. J. Woodward on the Use of AniphipleHra pelliicida as a 

 Test-object for High Powers, illustrated by a photograph. Dr. 

 Abbott concludes his exhaustive paper on the Stone Age of New 

 Jersey ; and the remainder of the number consists of reviews and 

 book notices, and of short paragraphs under the headings of the 

 various departments of natural science. 



In the number for May is a note by Mr. J. G. Hen- 

 derson on the use of the rattles of the rattlesnake, in which 

 he comes to a somewhat different conclusion from Prof. Shaler, 

 believing that it is protective in its object. — Mr. J. A. Allen 

 contributes some ornithological notes from the West, the present 

 communication referring to the birds of Kansas. — Prof A. H. 

 Tuttle gives the result of a careful study of the genus Urella of 

 Flagellate Infusoria, illustrated with a number of woodcuts. 



* Since writing the above 1 have seen a proof-sheet of a portion of the 

 forthcomio^ fourth report of the Missouri btate entomologist, Mr. Riley, in 

 which he enters into further details of the history of the Phylloxera, col- 

 lected during a recent visit to Europe, as well as from closer observations on 

 the subject made in America, where it appears to be acquiring more serious 

 importance, I have not, however, yet seen enough of the report to leara 

 what further conclusions Mr. Riley may have arrived at. 



