"As ivv the appearance of tlie insect which caused this calamity, 1 can 

 only say that, like other larvae of Aleyrodes, it was not even so big as the 

 head of the smallest pin in common use, and was of nearly circular outline, 

 but quite flat, and as thin as the finest paper. It never moved that I could 

 see, and seemed as if glued to the leaf, on which myriads of them were 

 huddled together. 



" Having thus been an eye-witness in the case, you may judge of my 

 astonishment when, only last year, I was informed here at the Hague by a 

 professional entomologist of some repute, that from the communication of 

 a friend of his who visited Cura9ao many years after the above-mentioned 

 occurrence, he felt convinced that the cocoa-nut trees in that island have 

 been destroyed by the caterpillar of a nocturnal lepidopteron. This absurd 

 notion T have not been able to dispel, not even by producing extracts from 

 the colonial newspaper, because, said he, although it appears therefrom 

 that the colonists hold the same opinion as I do, yet the question remained 

 whether that opinion is the right one. In reply, I can only say that 

 I never expected an entomologist to believe on mere hearsay that any 

 butterfly will soar to a height of sixty to eighty feet above the ground to 

 lay its eggs in trees which have so little to attract them as those of the 

 order PalmcB, whose leaves, from their texture, are unfit to serve as food 

 for the larvae of Lepidoptera. 



"Passing from this subject to that of the destruction of the cocoa-nut 

 trees in the coast regions of Guiana, here in Holland it seems nobody ever 

 heard of those trees suffering from insects in Surinam. I beg to refer to 

 Mr. liussell's report on the Aleyrodes, as well as on the beetle, which, long 

 before the arrival of the first-mentioned insect, about three or four years 

 ago, used to spoil the said trees in those districts, and which report must 

 have reached you long since, as it was read at one of the monthly meetings 

 of the Royal Agricultural and Commercial Society in Demerai'a, and 

 printed in the 'Royal Gazette' (George Town, British Guiana), of the 

 4th March, 1876. 



" From that paper, I see, Mr. Russell says his friend Dr. Whitlock calls 

 the beetle Passalus tridens, which, so far as I know, may be very correct, 

 though, judging from the appearance of one I saw in the museum at 

 Leyden, I should not have thought it capable of boring holes which have 

 been compared by Mr. Russell to those made by means of an augur. Among 

 the eight species of Passalus enumerated by Dr. Dalton, in his ' History of 

 British Guiana,' I do not find this one ; but, of course, that is no reason 

 why it should not be found there, as the author liimself does not pretend to 

 give a complete list of insects. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity 

 of inspecting a couple of beetles, which were caught on the estate of a 

 respected friend of mine, the Hon. A. D. van der Yon Netscher, formerly a 

 landed proprietor in Demerara, and member of the Council there. They 



