DIRFCT INJURIKS PROM MOTHS. 49 



them, and had the appearance of having been con- 

 sumed by fire.'* 



Still farther to the north, according to the account 

 of Pallas, a moth of another species is even more 

 troublesome and destructive than that above men- 

 tioned, extending its ravages to almost all green 

 things. This celebrated traveller tells us, that in 

 Kasau, a government of European Russia, lying 

 between the 46"° 20' and 49° 40' east longitude, and 

 the ,'54° and 57° of north latitude, the larva of the 

 Phalfpna frumentalis not unfrequently eats the 

 greater part of the spring corn to the root.t 



There is a white moth, the caterpillar of which 

 is a gi'eat nuisance to the sugar planters ; it is called 

 the Borer, and makes dreadful havoc amongst the 

 sugar canes of many of the colonies. The Society 

 of Arts offered a reward of fifty guineas to any one 

 who could invent a method for their destruction ; 

 but no effectual plan has yet been devised for ex- 

 pelling them. 



While on this subject, I may mention an insect, 

 although of a different order, which, in the West 

 Indies, commits still more dreadful havoc. A 

 frightful picture of their depredations is recorded in 

 the Philosophical Transactions. % This is a species 

 of ant, (the Formica sacckarivora of Linnteus,) 



• DeGeeh, ii. 341. 



f PiLLAs's Travels in South Russia, i. 30. 



+ Vol. XXX. p. 346- 



