187 



near the tips of the shoots. Every crevice in old 

 garden-walls often swarm with these weevils. No- 



thing would prove a greater check to their increase 

 than stopping all crevices, or holes in the walls, with 

 mortar, plaster-of-Paris, or Roman cement ; and the 

 interior of hot-houses should be annually washed 

 with lime ; the old bark of the vines under which 

 they lurk should be stripped off early in the spring, 

 and the roots examined in October, where they exhibit 

 any unhealthy symptoms from the attacks of the 

 maggots of C. sulcatus as soon as the beetles appear ; 

 sieves should be held at night under the branches 

 and leaves, when, by shaking them, the beetles 

 will readily fall into the sieves, but as they drop 

 down when approached, this operation must be pro- 

 ceeded with gently and quietly ; multitudes may be 

 thus collected, both in and out of doors, and if 

 the person who carries the light has a pail or jug of 

 water, the sieves may be emptied into them as occa- 

 sion may require ; but when the beetles are eventually 

 destroyed, boiling, not warm water, must be used, as 

 the hardness of their horny covering will resist a con- 

 siderable degree of heat. When the larvse are ascer- 

 tained to reside at the base of a wall, salt might be 



