INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 181 



corn. Reaumur informs us, that in Poitou, in certain 

 years, the grass of whole districts has been so destroyed 

 by it, as not to produce the food necessary for the suste- 

 nance of the cattle *. In many parts of England, in 

 Holderness particularly, it cuts off a large proportion of 

 the wheat crops, especially if sown upon clover-lays b . 

 Reaumur concludes from the observations he made that 

 it lives solely upon earth, and consequently that the injury 

 which it occasions, arises from its loosening the roots of 

 corn and grass by burrowing amongst them : but my 

 friend Mr. Stickney, the intelligent author of a treatise 

 upon this insect, is inclined to, think from his experiments 

 that it feeds on the roots themselves. However this may 

 be, the evil produced is evident ; and it appears too from 

 the observations of the gentleman last mentioned, that 

 this animal is not killed by lime applied in much larger 

 doses than usual c . 



Our national beverage ale, so valuable and heartening 

 to the lower orders, and so infinitely preferable to ardent 

 spirits and tea, is indebted to another vegetable, the hop, 

 for its agreeable conservative bitter. This plant so pre- 

 cious has numberless enemies in the Lilliputian world 

 to which I am introducing you. Its roots are subject to 



a Reaum. v. 11. 



b Two species are confounded under the appellation of the grub, 

 the larvae namely of Tipula oleracea and cornichia, which last is very 

 injurious, though not equally with the first. In the rich district of 

 Sunk Island'm Holderness, in the spring of 1813, hundreds of acres 

 of pasture have been entirely destroyed by them, being rendered as 

 completely brown as if they had suffered a three months drought, 

 and destitute of all vegetation except that of a few thistles. A square 

 foot of the dead turf being dug up, 210 grubs were counted in it 2 

 and, what furnishes a striking proof of the prolific powers of these 

 insects, the next year it was difficult to find a single one. 



c Stickney's Observations on ike Grub, 



