60 



only 71"^ Fabr., the mercury rose wbeu placed among the peas to OGo 

 Falir., a difference of 25^ ^'in a few minutes." 



This difference in temperature was evidently due in great part to a 

 mechanical cause, the gnawing* of the peas by the beetles and larwT, for 

 subsequent tests have shown that the difference in temperature between 

 uninfested peas in mass and the surrounding air in summer is slight, i 

 varying vrith the time of day, the peas being cooler thau the air at midday 

 and warmer after sundown. No opportunity has since offered, for test- 

 ing the temperature of the weevils alone in mass, although such compara 

 tive tests would be interesting. — L. O. H. 



ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY IN INDIA, 



We are indebted to Mr. E. C. Cotes, first assistant to the director of 

 the ludiau Museum at Calcutta, for copies of his first and second papers 

 upon economic entomology. No. 1 is devoted to a preliminary ac- 

 count of the wheat and rice weevil in India, and No. 2 considers the 

 experimental introduction of insecticides into India, with a short account 

 of modern insecticides and methods of applying them. Of the latter 

 we need not say anything, except that it is a short summary of a few of 

 the remedies now in use in this country. The first, however, is of 

 considerable interest as a consideration of the cosmopolitan Calandra 

 oryzw in a more or less tropical country in which the principal indus- 

 tries are wheat and rice. Mr. Cotes has gone over the ground of pre- 

 vious publications very carefully and introduces a great deal of inter- 

 esting correspondence. Nothing new in the way of remedies is suggested 

 and no particular experiments have apparently been made. The point 

 in his paper which interests us most is the statement of the loss which 

 is brought about. He says : " The amount of loss occasioned by the 

 weevil is estimated by Messrs.Ealli Brothers at an average of 2i ])er cent., 

 the maximum being 5 per cent, and the minimum 1 per cent. Taking 

 the value of the wheat exported at £6,000,000, the annual loss oc- 

 casioned by the weevil in exported wheat alone is £150,000. This sum, 

 however, in reality represents but a fraction of the whole loss, as it 

 does not take into account the damage done to wheat consumed in the 

 country or any of the loss occasioned to the rice, which is also attacked 

 by the same weevil, besides the loss indirectly occasioned owing to the 

 difiBculty of storing the grain." The species seems to be two-brooded 

 in India, the beetles appearing in June and January. 



BUFFALO GNATS ATTACKING ]\IAN. 



In our report for 1S8G we devoted a paragraph to the consideration 

 of several cases of loss of human life from the bites of Buffalo-gnats, 

 but our agents who have visited tlie region where these insects abound 

 find that rumors of su(;h cases are hard to trace and that the newspaper 

 reimrts are seldom authentic. All of the agents emi)l()yed on this in- 

 vestigation have been asked to verify if possible any such accounts, and 



