﻿54 FIELD AND FOREST. 



readers, particularly as it was found that but little had been published 

 on the subject, and in volumes not generally accessible. 



The first reference that we can give on the subject of jumping seeds, 

 of which there appear to be several kinds, is to the Proceedings of 

 the Entomological Society of London, Octobers, 1857. Seeds sent 

 from Mexico by the British Charge d' Affaires, apparently of a species 

 of Euphorbia, and containing larvge presumed to be lepidopterous, 

 were exhibited by the Secretary at that time. Other specimens of the 

 seeds had however been sent to England by different persons. At the 

 March meeting 1858, Mr. Westwood exhibited the perfect insect, a 

 Carpocapsa, bred from some of the seed, sand June 7th, 1858, a paper 

 with the description of the insect, named Carpocapsa saltitans, was 

 read and afterward published in the Proceedings of that date. Speci- 

 mens of the seeds were also forwarded in the spring of the same year 

 to Paris, where they were exhibited at the Academy of Science, and 

 in an interesting paper appearing subsequently in the Revue Zoolog- 

 ique, M. Lucas re-described the insect, being in ignorance of the fact 

 that it had already been named. In the Gardeners' 1 Chronicle of Nov- 

 ember 1 2th, 1859, there is a long article on the subject, over the fam- 

 iliar initials "J. O. W." (Westwood) in which these jumping seeds 

 from Mexico are figured and described, together with the insect 

 reared from them. 



These seeds, which often jumped to the distance of one and a half 

 inches, when laid upon something fiat and level, were about four-tenths 

 of an inch long, with a smooth surface, each resembling one of the 

 parts of an orange cut into thirds, three seeds evidently growing to- 

 gether, and forming a globular mass. The interior was occupied by 

 a fat grub or larva, which had consumed the whole inside of the seed, 

 leaving no excrement. The larva measured about eleven-twentieths of 

 an inch in length, had a small head, but strong jaws and the other 

 parts of the head of a lepidopterous larva. The legs were short, con- 

 sisting of three pairs attached to the first three segments of the body 

 behind the head, the fourth and fifth segments were footless, but each 

 of the four following had a pair of very short membranous feet, sur- 

 rounded with a circle of very minute spines, and there was another 

 pair at the extremity of the body. Larva yellowish whit£, with the head 

 chestnut brown. The chrysalis was furnished with transverse rows of 

 small refiexed spines on the segments of the abdomen, by the help of 



