THE FIRE WORM OF THE CRANBERRY. 1 5 



tabling a receiver attachment, as explained in the annexed figure, a 

 being the receiver in which the hellebore is placed from above, b the 

 ^-Q— -. tin nozzle into which it drops through The 



narrow aperture at the bottom, and c the 

 mouth of bellows. When examined in June 

 the protected space was completely stripped 

 of leaves, while the portion treated to hel- 

 lebore, though badly damaged, showed the 



b c u benefit of the treatment. To ascertain the 



Fig! i. -powder bellows. effect of hellebore on the larvae I placed sev- 



eral in a box of which the bottom had been dusted with hellebore. At first 

 they paid uo more attention to it than to so much dust: in ten minutes, 

 after a continuous travel through the stuff, they began picking up parti- 

 cles with their mandibles : in twenty minutes they were very uneasy, and 

 gradually became paralyzed, but were alive for more than an hour after- 

 ward. Ultimately the larvae all died. The experiment was carried on 

 in the open air. As to its effect when applied on the bog : It was applied 

 twice on a portion of the bog where the larva 1 were unusually abuudant. 

 and each time it seemed to reduce the number of larvae, and undoubtedly 

 did prevent their eating as much as they otherwise would have done, 

 yet in the very spots where it had been thus freely used the moths 

 appeared a few days later (June 11) by thousands. This was the result 

 wherever it was used; it undoubtedly did much good, but I believe less 

 by killing the larva* than by forcing them to leave their poisoned quar- 

 ters to seek food on the lower parts of the vine where they could do 

 less harm. A drawback in applying this and other insecticides is that 

 it is necessary to force it into the habitations of the insect, which is a diffi- 

 cult matter: moreover it is much more difficult to reach the second brood 

 than the first, because the fir.st spins up at the start only a leaf or two 

 at the extreme tip, and must soon come out for food: the second brood, 

 on the contrary, when it does begin to spin gathers up two or three 

 sprays — enough for three insects — and so need not at any time come 

 within reach of the poison, no matter how liberally applied outside 

 its habitation. I am satisfied that not only contact with but the act- 

 ual eating of white hellebore is requisite to destroy the insect. I con- 

 sider hellebore valuable, but not tin- most valuable insecticide. 



Bisulphide of Carbon. — Mr. Havens, of Prospertown, used a prepara- 

 tion said to be of this poison and handed me some to experiment with. 

 but without giving me any further information as to the nature of the 

 preparation, which was in the form of a brownish powder; it was tried 

 on several larva?, as in the case of the hellebore, and proved rather more 

 active, but having the same general effect. 1 believe it to be open to 

 the same objection there is to hellebore 



This could not have beeo the bisulphide of carbon. — C. V. K. 



