Retrospective Criticism. 79 



upon a piece of ground previously manured with good moist horse dung, and 

 trod in the seed well, immediately after sowing ; I also sowed at the same 

 time some of the same seed upon another piece of ground a few yards distant, 

 without either manuring or treading : the results were, in the former case, 

 every plant escaped the beetle's ravages ; in the latter, three fourths of the 

 plants were eaten off by the beetles. A friend sowed, in the usual way, seeds 

 of turnip upon a piece of garden ground, and the plants were eaten off; 

 he sowed a second and third time, with the same result ; he then well 

 manured the ground, sowed again, and the whole escaped. Another gentle- 

 man, a farmer, sowed part of a large field immediately after ploughing it, 

 indeed following the plough ; the remainder a few hours afterwards : the sun 

 being bright all day. On the former the young plants all escaped, and on the 

 latter the greater part of them were eaten off This case was not one made 

 by way of experiment, but was quite an accidental circumstance ,' a neigh- 

 bour, however, noticing it, asked the proprietor the reason, but he was unable 

 to explain it, or to state more than the facts already named. The gentleman 

 who asked the reason had himself tried liming the ground after sowing it, and 

 sooting it in the same way ; also sowing radish seed with the turnip seed, as 

 severally recommended in different parts of your Magazine, but without the 

 desired effect : in the latter case, particularly, he found that, after the beetles 

 had eaten the radish plant, they attacked the turnips. 



I am of opinion that the only practicable and effectual preventive of the 

 beetle's ravaging the crops of turnips is to sow the seed when the ground 

 is fresh and moist, and to roll it well, in order to preserve the moisture, 

 manuring also with moist dung if possible; as it is observable, in the 

 first case I have mentioned, that the moist manure and treading preserved 

 the crop ; in the second case, the moist manure alone ; and in the third case, 

 the fresh, and consequently moist, mould. I think also my opinion is farther 

 confirmed by the fact, that a wet summer produces, generally, an abundant 

 turnip crop, and a dry one the reverse. It would also appear that a moist 

 day should be preferred for sowing turnip seeds, and if the weather should 

 be so dry that sowing with moisture could not be farther adopted than by 

 sowing immediately after the mould is turned and is consequently fresh, 

 would not the application of the water cart have the desired effect ? [In 

 Encyc. of Agr. § 2692. 2d edit., will be found a figure and description of a 

 machine for sowing turnips and watering them at the same time.] I may 

 observe, that my opinion is founded upon a different principle to that sug- 

 gested in IX. 505. ; and I would request the reader to remark that I do not 

 say the plan I recommend will have the effect of destroying the beetles, but 

 of preserving the crop. Rusticus of Godalming, as it appears by the extract 

 in IX. 631., thinks that the eggs of the beetle are on the seed; but, if that be 

 the case generally, I would ask, why, in the cases given above (the same seed 

 being used for both plans in each case), were the plants not equally affected ? 

 I do not ask this in the spirit of contradiction, but to stimulate your readers 

 to farther examination on this very important subject. — Myles Priest. Reading 

 Nursery, Dec. 12. 1833. 



In addition to our quotation, in IX. 631., from Rusticus, we shall here give 

 another of his remarks : — " I had always observed that there was the greatest 

 quantity of grubs on very young plants, and that they were very various in 

 size, and that it was not till the plants were a fortnight or three weeks old 

 that the beetles appeared in any quantities ; yet there were some beetles from 

 the |very first coming up of the plant." A writer in The British Farmer's 

 Magazine, for November 1833, p. 426., reviews Rusticus's discovery, and 

 applauds its great probable value, should it be proved to be true; but objects 

 to Rusticus's asserting that the young plants of turnips are more extensively 

 ravaged by the grubs of the beetle than they are by the beetle itself, and con- 

 tends that it is by the beetle itself that the injury and destruction are achieved. 

 It may be well to remark here, that the grub of a beetle and the perfect beetle 

 are in some species very similar : we know not whether they be so or not in the 



