132 



depth of from 2 to 2^ feet being necessary in case of burying, and he 

 suggests also that all refuse on common dumps be disinfected. Any- 

 thing that will prevent the stock from abrasions of the skin is a pre- 

 ventive, and the statement is made that the barbed-wire fence and the 

 Screw- Worm Fly go hand in hand. In the matter of remedies, a long 

 list of substances has been experimented with, and it will be unneces- 

 sary to mention them in detail, as but one is unhesitatingly recom- 

 mended. This is crude carbolic acid. When the maggots have been 

 eliminated from the wound the latter should be washed thoroughly 

 with warm water and dressed with carbolized oil (1 part carbolic acid, 

 16 of oil). If there is a cavity, lint cotton saturated with the oil should 

 be inserted. Tar, grease, and fish-oil are recommended as ointments. 

 The common use of mercurials is deprecated on account of the danger 

 of the animal licking the parts. 



We are sorry to see that the author has not experimented with 

 pyrethrum, which is useful in destroying the worms and particularly in 

 causing them to forsake the affected parts. Our first specimens of this 

 worm were sent us back in the sixties as abounding in the refuse of 

 osage orange fruit from which the seed had been abstracted, and Mr. 

 Morgan's experience corroborates this vegetal-feeding habit in a species 

 normally sarcophagous and helcophagous. We have long been inter- 

 ested in this insect, and are pleased that Mr. Morgan has so thoroughly 

 covered the ground in his little bulletin, which, by the way, is stated to 

 be preliminary in its nature. It is a valuable contribution to the some- 

 what extensive literature on the subject, which for the most part con- 

 cerns the insect's relations to man rather than to live-stock, and we wish 

 that he had omitted the perfectly ridiculous figures of the insect, which 

 serve no other purpose than to prejudice the character of the text. 



Physiognomy of the American Tertiary Hemiptera.* — Mr. S. H. Scudder 

 has just published under this caption a very interesting contribution 

 to the paleontology of entomology. An interesting comparison is drawn 

 between the fossil Hemiptera of Europe and America (including the 

 species found in amber), showing that 266 species have been found in 

 American strata as against 218 in European strata. A number of 

 striking generalizations are made, from which it appears tbat the 

 general facies of the Hemipterous fauna is American ; that all the 

 species are extinct; that no species are identical with any European 

 tertiary forms; that a very considerable number of genera are ex- 

 tinct ; that existing genera which are represented in the American 

 tertiaries are mostly American, not infrequently subtropical or tropical 

 American, and where found also in the Old World are mostly those 



^Author's extras from the Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, 

 vol. xxiv, 1889, pages 562 to 579. 



