170 INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



ants^ ; — and, what is more extraordinary, ^woS/wm ^aniccum^ has been 

 known to devour the blister-beetle (^Cantharis vesicatoria), and even, as 

 has been already observed, Cayenne pepper. Swammerdam amongst his 

 treasures mentions " a detestable beetle," produced from a worm that eats 

 the roots of ginseng ; and he likewise notices another, the larvae of which 

 devours the bag of the musk.^ The cochineal, at Rio de Janeiro, is the 

 prey of an insect resembling an Ichneumon, but furnished with only two 

 wings ; its station is in the cotton that envelops the Coccus. Previous to 

 its assumption of the pupa, it ejects a large globule of pure red coloring 

 matter.'* And lastly, the Coccus that produces the lac (C laced) is, we 

 are told, devoured by various insects.^ 



Perhaps you may imagine that these universal destroyers spare at least 

 our garments, in which you may at first conceive there can be nothing 

 very tempting to excite even the appetite of an insect. Your housekeeper, 

 however, would probably tell you a different story, and enlarge upon the 

 trouble and pains it costs her to guard those under her care against the 

 ravages of the moths. Upon further inquiry you would find that nothing 

 made of wool, whether cloth or stuff, comes amiss to them. There are 

 five species described by Linne, which are more or less engaged in this 

 work : — Tinea vestianella, tapetzeUa, jpcUionella, Laverna sarcitella, and 

 Galleria mellonella. Of the first we have no particular history, except 

 that it destroys garments in the summer; but of the others Reaumur has 

 given a complete one. T. tapetzella, or the tapestry moth, not uncom- 

 mon in our houses, is most injurious to the lining of carriages, which are 

 more exposed to the air than the furniture of our apartments. These do 

 not construct a moveable habitation like the common species, but, eating 

 their way in the thickness of the cloth, weave themselves silken galleries 

 in which they reside, and which they render close and warm by covering 

 them with some of the eroded wool.*" T. peUiotieUa is a most destructive 

 insect ; and ladies have often to deplore the ravages which it commits in 

 their valuable furs, whether made up into muffs or tippets. It pays no 

 more respect to the regal ermine than to the woollen habiliments of the 

 poor; its proper food, indeed, being hair, though it devours both wool and 

 fur. This species, if hard pressed by hunger, will even eat horse-hair, 

 and make its habitation, a moveable house or case in which it travels from 

 place to place, of this untractable material. These little creatures will 

 shave the hair from a skin as neatly and closely as if a razor had been 

 i}m ployed.'' The most natural food of the next species, L. sarcitcUa, is 

 wool ; but in case of necessity it will eat fur and hair. To woollen cloths 

 or stuffs it often does incredible injury, especially if they are not kept dry 

 and well aired.^ Of the devastation committed by Galleria mellonella in 

 our bee-hives I have before given you an account : to this I must here add, 

 that if it cannot come at wax, it will content itself with woollen cloth, 

 leather, or even paper.^ Mr. Curtis found the grub of a beetle (Ptinus 



' On examining; ninetj^-two chests of opium, part of the cargo saved from the Charlton, 

 previously to rcshipping them from Cliittagong for China, thirteen were found to be full of 

 white ants, which had almost wholly devoured the opium. {Article from Chittagong, Nov. 

 1812, in one of the Newspapers^ July 31, 1813.) 



2 Ptinus ruhdhis, Marsh. 3 Bihh Nat. i. 125. b. 126. a. 



* Sir Geo. Staunton's Voij. 8vo. 189. 



* Kerr in Pliilos. Trans. 1781. 



6 Reaum. iii. 266. ' Ibid. 59. s jbid. 40, » Ibid. 257. 



