60 
VORACITY OF THE GRUBS. 
sudden appearance of small round holes ranged in irregu- 
lar rows : in each of these holes one of the tiny gluttons 
may he seen clasping the eaten part of the leaf hetween his 
legs and elevating the end of his hody in the air. I give 
you a sketch of the leaf, showing this first stage of the evil, 
because at this period the progress of the plague may he 
arrested, and I consider it important to make horticulturists 
acquainted with its exact appearance : the grubs are too 
small to be shown, you will therefore understand that the 
appearance of the leaf is all that I aim at in the figure. At 
this nick of time, by a little care and industry, you may 
save your gooseberries. Now that leaf has sixty-seven 
grubs feeding on it : each grub will eat three leaves before 
it is full fed : argal, if you destroy that one leaf and all its 
inhabitants, you save two hundred and one leaves. If you 
have no time to look for these leaves yourself, get some 
children to do it ; they will soon take an interest in the 
occupation, particularly if backed by a few coppers : surely 
you would not object to give a child a halfpenny a score 
for such leaves, and that price would be quite sufiicient to 
clear the vision and sharpen the intellects of many a hun- 
gry boy. I would also recommend young ladies to look 
after such leaves, and pick them into a hand-basket, the 
contents of which may be emptied into a bucket of water 
standing near, or disposed of in a variety of ways. If yoi* 
neglect the trees at this critical time, each infested leaf will 
be quickly stripped of all its green, the ribs alone remain- 
ing : the grubs then descend its foot-stalk, and wandering 
in different directions each finds a leaf for himself, and the 
work of devastation begins in earnest. 
The grub is known to every gardener, indeed so well 
known, that you may perhaps consider it a waste of time 
