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LETTER VIIL 



INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



INDIRECT irnVRIES— concluded. 



I HAVE not yet arrived at the end of my catalogue of noxious 

 insects. I have introduced you, indeed, to those that annoy 

 man in his own person, in his domestic animals, in the produce 

 of his fields, gardens, orchards, and forests ; in a word, in 

 every thing that is endued with the vital principle : but I 

 have as yet said nothing of the injuries which he receives 

 from them in that part of his property, consisting either of 

 animal or vegetable matter, from which that principle is de- 

 parted. And with these I shall conclude this melancholy 

 detail of evils inflicted upon us by the very animals I am en- 

 ticing you to study. The rest of my correspondence, I flatter 

 myself, will paint them in more inviting colours. 



The insects to which I now allude may be divided into those 

 that attack and injure our food, our drugs and medicines, our 

 clothes, our houses and furniture, our timber, and even the 

 objects of our studies and amusements. 



Various are those that attempt to share our food with us. 

 Flour and meal are eaten by the grub of Teiiehrio molitor, 

 best known by the name of the meal-worm, which will remain 

 in it two years before it goes into its state of inactivity : — its 

 ravages, however, are not confined to flour alone, for it will eat 

 any thing made of that article, such as bread, cakes, and the 

 like. Old flour is also very apt to be infested by a mite 

 (^Acarus farince).^ In long voyages the biscuit sometimes so 

 swarms with the weevil and another beetle {Dermestes pani- 

 ceiis L.), that they are swallowed with every mouthful ; and 

 even the ground peas so abound with these little vermin that 



' Amcen. Acad. iii. 345. 



o 2 



