Hemarks on Aphides. 443 



seem, has been known to influence the returns of the hop 

 trade to the amount of 426,000/. in one year (1825), in the 

 duty alone ; and, says Rusticus, " this seems a large sum, 

 but it is not one twentieth pai't of the sums gained and lost by 

 dealers during 1825, and the following year, 1826." 



We omit to notice in detail the interesting statements sup- 

 plied on this species, and present, by permission, our young 

 gardening friends with the remarks of Rusticus on the habits 

 of the species of A^phis generally, because we feel conscious 

 that they will prove highly interesting and instructive. 



" The true blight, or aphis, is a quiet, dull, stupid-looking insect, mostly 

 without wings, but sometimes it has four, two of which are much larger and 

 longer than the other two, and fold over and hide them, reaching beyond 

 the body and meeting together behind it: these wings are generally as clear 

 as crystal, with a few veins in them, yet if you hold the insect in the sun- 

 shine, and examine him through a glass, you will find they take all the 

 colours of the rainbow : you will also find he has a long trunk or sucker, 

 which is used as a pump or siphon, through which the sap of plants is 

 drawn. I have sometimes seen this sucker so long as to pass under the 

 breast and legs, and reach a considerable distance behind the body, but 

 it is not generally so. All blights infest the young and juicy shoots and 

 leaves of plants, for the purpose of sap-sucking : and the plants honoured 

 by their operations forthwith play the most amusing and incredible 

 vagaries : bearing blossoms instead of leaves, leaves instead of blossoms : 

 twisting into corkscrews stems which ought to be straight, and making 

 straight as sticks those which, like the scarlet runner and hop, ought to 

 twine; sometimes, as in the peach, making the leaves hump up in the 

 middle, and causing the tree to look as though it had a famous crop of 

 young fruit j making apple trees bear blossoms on their roots, and causing 

 roots to grow out of their young shoots ; and, by tormenting orchards in 

 this way, preventing the fruit from ripening, and making it woolly, taste- 

 less, and without juice. Our China asters often owe a good deal of their 

 beauty to these vermin ; they act as a spur to make them blossom bej'ond 

 their strength and nature, and then die off without bearing seed. It is 

 amusing to see with what regularity the blight station themselves on the 

 young shoots of the Guelder rose, crowding so close together that not a 

 morsel of the rind is to be seen, and not unfrequently forming a double 

 tier, or two thicknesses; the poor sprig losing its formal unbending up- 

 right position, and writhing itself into strange contortions. 



" Blights are of all colours, but green is their most fashionable hue ; 

 those of broad beans are black as soot, and velvety ; and these, if attended 

 to, do but little harm ; they cluster at the very top, and each bean should be 

 lopped just below the blight, and the top carried away and burnt, not 

 thrown on the ground, or else they are sure to climb up the bean stalks 

 again, and, stopping here and there at the best landing place, to increase 

 and multiply, thus soon covering the whole plant; nor should they be 

 buried in the ground, for they take care to outwit you by living under 

 ground for months, and, when the gardener's spade turns them up again, 

 they make for the beans directly : the plan of lopping the beans does 

 not injure the crop, but, if carefully done, rather improves it. The blight 

 of the willow is very large, and, at first sight looks greyish, but under a 

 glass is beautifully variegated with black and white : when crushed it 

 gives out a deep blood-coloured dye, which stays on your hand several 

 days, in spite of frequent washings. 



