CHAP. XL 1 1. ROSA V CEJE. RO y SA. 811 



tionary measure have been neglected, care should be taken to watch for the 

 appearance of the first brood, and, as soon as the insects are perceived, to 

 destroy them with lime or tobacco water, or by fumigation ; taking care never 

 to use the nearly boiling water after the buds are expanded, though it will not 

 do the slightest injury before that period. Each succeeding brood being 

 much more numerous than those which preceded it, is more difficult to 

 destroy ; till the summer broods, if suffered to appear, completely clothe the 

 young shoots, so as to make them seem nearly three times their natural thick- 

 ness. In this state, the best remedy is to put h lb. of the best strong tobacco 

 into a gallon of hot water, and, as soon as the infusion has become cold, to dip 

 the young shoots into it, letting them remain a few seconds in the water, and, 

 if they are in a very bad state, going over them a second time. After this the 

 shoots should be carefully washed with clean water, and the insect will 

 generally be found to be destroyed. (See Gard. Mag., vol. x. p. 215.) Choice 

 plants may be freed from the aphides by going over the whole plant with a 

 soft brush ; laying the infected shoots in the palm of one hand, and brushing 

 off the insects with the other. Pruning is of little use, as the aphides 

 generally attack all the young shoots of a plant at the same time. (See Encyc. 

 of Gard., edit. 1S35, p. 1076.) The plants may also be syringed with water 

 in the evening, and then dusted with powdered tobacco leaves, or refuse 

 snuff; or they may be syringed with lime water. The prodigious fecundity of 

 the A^phis rosae almost surpasses belief. " Reaumur has calculated that, in 

 five generations, one aphis maybe the progenitor of 5,904,900,000 descendants ; 

 and in ordinary seasons, there are ten generations produced 

 on rose bushes in the space of nine months." (See Encyc of 

 Gard., p. 1076.) 



The larva, or grub {fig. 547. 6), of the lady-bird (a) should 

 always be spared by gardeners, as it lives on the aphides. 

 This grub is short and thick, of a blackish purple, spotted 

 with yellow or black, and is very active. A few of these 

 insects would soon clear a tolerably large rosarium of the 

 aphides. The larvae of several flies (Syrphus Fr.) (c) are 

 furnished with a singular mouth, armed like a trident, with 

 three points, for transfixing their prey, of which they devour 

 amazing numbers. Small singing birds also destroy great 

 numbers. 



The caterpillars of several small moths, though not so destructive as the 

 aphides, also materially injure the buds and young shoots of rose trees. One 

 of these is of a green colour, with a few black hairs scattered on its body : 

 it sews up the tender leaves by means of silken threads, and takes its station 

 within, concealed from all observation. The leaves of the rose tree are often 

 marked, in autumn, on their upper surfaces, in various directions, with broad 

 brown lines, leaving a narrow black one running down the middle. This 

 curious appearance is produced by the small caterpillar of a minute moth 

 (Microsetia ruficapitella StepL), which feeds inside the leaf. The caterpillar, 

 when full grown, is nearly two lines long, and of a yellow orange colour, with 

 a brown mark down the back. It lives upon the thickness of the pulp under 

 the epidermis ; and the brown mark is caused by the epidermis drying, in con- 

 sequence of the insect having eaten the substance of the leaf beneath. The 

 black mark is produced by its egesta, or excrement. The caterpillar is full 

 grown about the 24th of October, when it eats its way out of the leaf for 

 the first time, and crawls down the branches and stem, until it has found a 

 convenient place to fix its cocoon. The perfect insect is called the red-headed 

 pygmy by Haworth ; and it is so small, that the expansion of its wings mea- 

 sures only two lines and three quarters. (Ibid.) 



Others, and perhaps the most destructive, of the insect enemies of rose 

 trees are the caterpillars, grubs, maggots, or larvae, of one of the saw fly tribe 

 (Tenthredinidae), which, when full grown, just before they change into the 

 pupa state, are about half an inch long, and of the thickness of a crow-quill, 



