Insects in the Garden S17 
harmless. If this were true, white hellebore would be 
especially valuable for use on salad vegetables. There 
is, however, considerable doubt that it becomes harm- 
less in a short time, and for this reason its application 
on leaves that are to be used as food is to be safe- 
guarded, as noted in the next paragraph. 
Caution. Paris green, arsenate of lead, and white 
hellebore are deadly poisons to human beings. All 
supplies of these materials should be kept where children 
cannot obtainthem. In the home garden, poisons should 
be used only when no other means are effective, and then 
only by experienced persons. 
When these poisons are used in the dust form, children 
should be careful not to get dust in their own faces or 
in the faces of others. Leafy crops should be sprayed 
with poisons only when young, long before they are to be 
used as food. Poisons should not be applied to cabbages 
after the heads are beginning to form. 
Cutworms. Cutworms often do much damage by 
chewing through and cutting off the tender stems of 
young plants of beans, corn, tomatoes, onions, sweet 
potatoes, and cabbages. These “‘ worms ” are the cater- 
pillars or larve of night-flying moths. During summer 
evenings they often fly through open windows into a 
room and flit about a lighted lamp. 
The eggs are laid in late summer; the young cater- 
pillars that soon hatch from them feed during autumn 
chiefly on the roots of grasses, and then live over winter 
as half-grown caterpillars. Hence cutworms are almost 
sure to be present in a garden that was in sod the previous 
year. In the spring they crawl over the surface of the 
