d e r W u 1 p (Tijdsohr. entom., XXXIV, 1891, p. 216) 

 von der Drosophila mgropunctala n. sp. aus Java gibt, 

 ganz gut der Dr. repleta entspricht; und damit ist die 

 Synonymie und Verbreitung der Species vermehrt. 

 Die Art habe ich auch in Mailand gefunden; 

 Dr. Speiser hat die Art auch m Luino am Lage 

 Maggiore gefunden; und Dr. Villeneuve schreibt 

 mir, daß er dieselbe von der Insel Réunion erhal- 

 ten hat. 



Ferner erhielt ich in diesem Jahre dieselbe Art 

 von Herrn Terry von Honolulu auf den Hawaii- 

 schen Inseln! Unter den vielen Drosopihilen der Fauna 

 Hawaiiensis von G r i m s h a w ist die Art zum Glücke 

 nicht enthalten, sonst wären wir vielleicht einem neuen 

 Synonymen begegnet. 



Herr Terry hat dort die Art aus menschlichen 

 Exkrementen gezogen. Das Puparium zeigt sehr lange 

 Vorderstigmen, welche am Ende mit 10 — 12 langen, 

 sternartig geordneten Fortsätzen bewimpert sind. 



Synonymie und Verbreitung dieser niedlichen Art 

 sind also Mde folgt zu geben. 



Drosophila repleta Wollaston 1858 (punctulata 

 L o e w 1862, adspersa M i k 1886, nigropunctata Wulp 

 1891, marmoria Hutton 1900). 



Europa : Oesterreich, Wien (M i k , P o k o r n y) ; 

 Italien, Mailand, Turin (B e z z i), Luino (Speiser); 

 Spanien, Algeciras, Escorial (Czerny, Strobl). 



Afrika : Madeira (W ollaston); Teneriffa (B e c- 

 ker!); Aschanti, Westafrika (Mik); Réunion (Ville- 

 neuve) . 



Asien: Java (V a n d e r W u 1 p). 



Neu-Seeland : Auckland (S uteri, Hutton). 



Hawaiische Inseln: Honolulu (Terry!). 



Nordamerika: Florida ( J o h n s o n). 



Zentralamerika: Kuba (Loew); Saint Vincent 

 (Willi s ton). 



Südamerika : von nicht bestimmtem Orte (B e z z i !) 



57: 16. 5 



Insects destructive to Books.^) 



By William R. R&inick. 



Chief of the Department of Public Documents, 



The Free Library of Philadelphia. 



Through and through the inspired leaves, 

 Ve maggots, make your windings; 



But oh! respect his lordship's taste, 

 And spare his golden binding». 



Robert Burns. 



I liave been investigating the subject, ,, insects that 

 destroy books", for a number of years; and this paper 

 is simply a summary of a few of the facts that I have 

 discovered and collected. No attempt has been made 

 to make it comjolete, either as to species of insects, or 

 subject matter under any particular group. These, 

 in a complete form, with the results of the further ex- 

 periments now being made to prove the theory ad- 

 vanced, will be published later. 



Various insects have been named as the true book- 

 worm. The insect known as the cigarette beetle, Sito- 



drepa panicea, is given as the true bookworm by Prof. 

 L. O. Howard, United States Entomologist; but if 

 tiie name of ,, bookworm" is given to the insect which 

 causes the greatest destruction, then this species will 

 have to be placed quite a distance down in the list. 

 Personally, I will not try at the present time to settle 

 the (jucstion as to the species which is to be given 

 this doubtful honor. 



That a knowledge of the fact that books are de- 

 stroyed by insects is not of recent acquisition may be 

 gathered from the writings of the ancients. 



The earhest reference, according to Austen i), was 

 rescued from oblivion by the lad Salmasius, in 1606, 

 when he discovered the manuscripts of the anthology 

 of Cephalus, in the libraries ot the Counts Palatine, 

 at Heidelberg. Among the fragments in this col- 

 lection is one attributed to Evenus, the sophist-poet 

 of Paros, who wrote about 450 B.C. 



Aristotle speaks of a ,, little scorpion-like creature 

 found in books", which was evidently a species of 

 Acarina or pseudoscorpions. Horace and Ovid also 

 speak of the bookworm. Pliny, in his ,, Natural Hi- 

 story", has very little to say upon the subject. Mar- 

 tial, who lived in the first, and Lucian, in the second 

 century, A.D., speak of the bookworm, and many other 

 writers mention them; but it was not until 1665, \\'hen 

 Hook in his ,,Micographia", published an account 

 and gave an illustration of the insect, that entomolo- 

 gists were enabled to determine with any accuracy 

 the insect that was named as the cause of the destruc- 

 tion of books. It is impossible from Hook's descrip- 

 tion to tell what species was meant; but the illustra- 

 tion accompanying the description shows that it must 

 have been a species of Thysanura or Gollembola, com- 

 monly known as the silver-fish and spring-tails. 



It has been stated that more books and papers 

 are destroyed by small forms of hfe in one year than 

 by fire and water combined ; and, from the facts given 

 by various writers, and the statements made to me 

 in letters by many librarians and others, especially 

 where the libraries are located in the warmer regions, 

 I am positive that this statement is true. Those in 

 charge of collections in the temperate regions, whose 

 volumes are not as rapidly destroyed, are apt to doubt 

 the enormous destruction of books each year by prac- 

 tically unseen life. 



Again, that tliis destruction is great enough to 

 cause alarm, is indicated by the number of prizes of- 

 fered by various bodies for means to prevent this 

 never-ceasing destruction. Prizes were offered by 

 the ,, Royal Society at Göttingen in 1774, the ,, Inter- 

 national Library Congress" in 1903, etc., biit as yet 

 no satisfactory results have been obtained. I hope 

 before long to be able to present to the world the cause 

 of these ravages and a means of preventing them. 



Those who have read articles upon the destruction 

 of books and pajaers by insects must have noticed that 

 in almost all the papers the author has simpl.v stated 

 that the insects were after the paste used in the bin- 

 ding; and most of the prizes that have been offered 



1) Reprinted from American Journal ot Pharmacy j ') Bookworms in fact and fani>v, 

 1910. I Monthly, 1899, vol. 35. 



Popular Science 



