affectimj the Turnip -Crop a. 
125 
coidal ami seven posterior cells ; balancers pale, the club fus- 
cous ; six lc>js long, very slender, and pubescent; thighs long, 
shanks longer, especially the hinder ; feet long, fivc-jointed, basal 
joint very long, fourth and fifth elhptical, the latter furnished with 
two minute claws and suckers : length, 3^ lines ; expanse of 
wings, 6|. 
The Acari, or mites found with the maggots, were the size of 
a grain of sand ; most of them were reddish-brown, but some, 
M hich were smaller and younger, were whitish : the two feelers 
and eight legs were hairy and pale ochreous. They probably 
had been introduced by the large rove-beetles, which are often 
infested by these pai'asites; and they may attack the various 
larviE inhabiting the turnips, and perhaps destroy the eggs from 
which they are produced; but these are only conjectures.* On 
another occasion I examined some diseased and enlarged cab- 
bage-stalks at the end of May, and on opening one of the galls, 
which was soft, I found it filled with a white acarus; the four 
hinder legs were much smaller than the others, and the tips were 
furnished with a single claw. 
There is frequently a variety of rove-beetles in rotten turnips, 
principally of the genera Aleochara f and Oocyteliis ; ^ their habits 
are similar, being constantly found in decomposing animal and 
vegetable substances : wlien turnips have what is termed a 
" grubbed" appearance, it has been attributed to the larvae of 
these little beetles ; and Sir Joseph Banks stated that forty or fifty 
of the larvae of a Staphylinvs had been discovered in October just 
below the leaves in a single bulb.§ I also received specimens of 
the above genera from the liev. T. H. Scott, of Whitfield Rec- 
tory, near Heydon Bridge, Northumberland. They made their 
appearance about the beginning of July ; and on hoeing the 
turnips they were observed about the roots, and were gnawing 
them. This is remarkable ; for two of these beetles lived three 
months upon maggots found in some turnips. || It is not the 
turnips alone that are infested by this tribe of insects; for this, 
or a similar larva to the above, sometimes does great mischief to 
wheat-crops, as we shall show in a future communication. On 
digging up some old turnips in the garden the end of last March, 
I found several of the larvae (fig. 28) in the rotten bulbs, with 
eight or ten specimens of a small rove-beetle, which I doubt not 
* In a recent number of the Trans, of the Ent. Soc. it is stated that the 
Aleochara themselves feed upon the Acari. Vide vol. iii. p. 111. 
t Curtis's Guide, Gen. 221 ; and Brit. Ent., Homalota and Phytosus, pi 
and fol. 514 and 718. 
X Ibid., Gen. 21G. 
§ Kirby and Spence's Introd. to Ent., vol. i. p. 18G. 
II Gardener's Mag. vol. viii. p. 323. 
