Gold Mines of Virginia. 443 
CO be this species of Lamia. "When the egg from which this in- 
sect sprung was originally inserted, we have no means of deter- 
mining, but may necessarily infer that years must have elapsed 
from that period to its present appearance. Local causes, we 
have no doubt may long retard the developement of the egg of an 
insect, and we may reasonably suppose that this, in the present 
instance, was the case. 
This insect is about an inch and a quarter in length, with the 
antennae, or horns, extending from once, and in the males to 
twice that distance: on each side of the thorax is a pointed tu- 
bercle or wart. Its color is a mottled black and gray, while the 
wino--covers are coarsely punctured, and contained several tufted 
spots of black. 
The pine trees in this vicinity are sometimes completely riddled 
into strange labyrinthical forms, by what is supposed to be the larvse 
of this species. The habits of this insect, together with those of 
many others that infest the trees of our forests, have had so few 
intelligent observers to record their various systems of proceeding, 
in their devastating progress, that few remedies have been sug- 
gested for their destruction. 
GOLD MINES OF VIRGINIA. 
BY M. T. BROCKELBANK. 
The monopoly of the quicksilver mines created by the Roths- 
childs, has been of great injury to the mining interests everywhere. 
Could quicksilver be purchased at a reasonable rate, the great 
mining interests, which to every country are of incalculable worth, 
would receive new energy and assume a more inviting and im- 
portant aspect. Greedy speculation has almost had its day and 
men have at last learned that nothing but unremitting enterprize, 
in most departments of labor, can be sure of a reward. The 
evolving of new principles and methods by experiment and per- 
fecting them by practice, are the order of the day; and are what 
thinking people rejoice at as an evidence of a more rational age. 
Especially so is it in agriculture. Yet, a few years ago, farmers 
looked imploringly to the stars, the seasons, the clouds and the 
rain, thinking that these alone would determine the fate of their 
crops, never dreaming that it belonged to them to study books in 
order to make the wheat grow, or that a more potent fate than is 
given to the stars and seasons, rested in their own heads and 
hands, if they would but consult science, cast aside their old 
