1871.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
4r59 
The Chinese Quince. 
We do not know how so many Chinese 
Quince-trees became distributed about the 
country without the owners of them having 
their names. For several autumns, including 
the one just past, we have received a number 
of fruits from different points 
in the vicinity of New York 
to be named. This year 
one of them remained on 
exhibition at our office for 
several days, where it at- 
tracted much attention from 
its novel shape. We have 
had the fruit and leaves en- 
graved at about half the 
average natural size. The 
tree grows in a spreading 
form, and reaches the hight 
of about 20 feet. The leaves 
are quite unlike iu appear- 
ance to those of the commou 
quince, being of a dark green, 
with a shiniDg surface. The 
flowers are rose-colored, 
with a violet odor, becom- 
ing darker with age, and 
make the tree quite orna- 
mental in spring. The fruit 
is irregularly egg-shaped, 
green, and very hard and 
dry. We do not know that 
aDy use can be made of the 
fruit, but it is quite con- 
spicuous and ornamental 
when upon the tree. The botanical name is 
Cydonia Sinensis. We do not find the plant in 
any of the catalogues of our leading nursery- 
men, and can not say where it may be procured. 
m— ->» .-• 
The Great White Leopard-Moth. 
(Ecpanlheria scribonia, Stoll.) 
This worm feeds upon the wild Sun-flower 
(Helianthus decapetalus), the different species of 
Plautaiu (Plantago), and upon Willows. It 
comes to its growth iu the fall, and, like many 
others of its family, curls up and passes the 
winter in any shelter that it can find, being es- 
pecially fond of getting under the bark of old 
There is a large family of moths, known as 
Arctians (Arctiada) or Tiger-moths, which is 
rendered conspicuous by the beauty of design 
and boldness of contrast in color which its 
members generally present. The largest and 
perhaps the most beautiful of them all in North 
America is the above-named species. The 
larva has recently been sent to us for determina- 
tion, and through the courtesy of Mr. C. V. 
Riley, the State 
Entomologist of 
Missouri, we 
are able to give 
a brief account 
of its history. 
; This larva (fig. 
1) may be call- 
ed the Large 
Black Bear, as 
the hairy worms 
of our different 
Arctians are popularly called bears, and the 
family name .was derived from the Greek word 
for " bear. It is often observed in the fall of the 
year, though few persons have ever seen the 
moth which it produces. This larva is black, 
and so thickly covered with jet black spines as 
almost to hide a series of roughened warts on 
each joint, from which the spines spring. When 
disturbed, it curls itself up, and then the sutures 
of the joints arc seen to be reddish brown, iu 
strong contrast with the black of the rest of the 
body. If carefully observed, the spines will be 
seen to be barbed, as represented at b, fig. 1. 
CL 
Kgi 1.— LAIiV. 
CHINESE QUINCE. 
trees. In the spring, it feeds for a few days on 
almost any green thing that presents itself, and 
then forms a loose cocoon, interwoven with its 
own black spines, and become? a chrysalis. 
Shortly afterwards the moth escapes. 
The accompanying illustration (fig. 2) repre- 
sents the female moth at «, and the male at b. 
The upper portion of the abdomen is steel-blue, 
or blue-black, marked lougitudiually along the 
middle and sides with yellow or orange. With 
this exception, the whole insect is white marked 
and patterned with dark brown, as in the fig- 
ures. The male differs from 
the female principally in his 
smaller size and more acumi- 
nate wings, and by the narrow- 
er abdomen, which is also 
generally duller in color, with 
the pale markings less distinct. 
The markings on the wings, 
which may be likened to 
scribblings, vary in a striking 
manner in different individu- 
als, the oval or elliptical rings 
sometimes filling up so as to 
form black spots. This insect 
is considered rare in New Eng- 
land, but is much more com- 
mon in the Mississippi Valley. 
Don't Cover too Eaklt.— 
Many mistake the use of a 
winter mulch. It is not to 
prevent the ground from 
freezing, but to protect the 
plants from the injury that re- 
sults from frequent freezing and thawing. 
Hence we do not cover our strawberry beds and 
other things until cold weather has apparently 
set iu and the ground has begun to freeze. So 
with covering half-hardy shrubs with straw or 
mats, we do it quite as much to protect them 
from the winter's suu as to ward off the frost. 
The Crimson and White Mignonettes. 
BT rETER HENDERSON. 
Iu these days of gigantic frauds that have so 
astounded the people of the great metropolis, 
the lesser ones that crop out in the every-day 
things of life are apt to be overlooked or for- 
gotten. Yet the fifty cents 
paid for a package of worth- 
less flower-seeds is to rnau)- 
thousands of the lovers of 
nature in the humbler walks 
of life as much felt as are 
the thousands fraudulently 
extracted from the pockets 
of our wealthy taxpayers by 
dishonest rulers. The prin- 
ciple is the same in either 
case, aud the crime is 
"theft" in both. If I know- 
ingly advertise a mignonette 
that I am sure is green and 
brown as " crimson " or as 
" white," and thereby induce 
a person to pay me fifty 
cents for what to him is 
worthless, I am as guilty of 
stealing as the man was that 
received $500 apiece for the 
City Hall chairs. Dozens 
of seedsmen unwittingly did 
so last season, and retailed 
the English descriptions of 
"crimson" and "white" 
mignonettes with wonder- 
ful unanimity, and a con- 
fidence in the veracity of our English con- 
temporaries which past experience hardly war- 
ranted. The " White " Mignonette was issued 
under the indorsement of the London Horticul- 
tural Society, and we naturally thought that 
such a bod}' would not have lent themselves to 
fraud. Yet the fact is, that in no case that 
we have seen or heard of in this country 
has the "White" Mignonette proved much 
different from or whiter than that which our 
grandmothers grew. The same may be said of 
the "Srimsou." The tinge on the tips of flow- 
:J. — MALE AND FEMALE LEOPARD-MOTH. 
ers may be a little darker brown, but no stretch 
of imagiuation could honestly call it crimson. 
I trust this lesson will not be lost on us, and 
that for our own sakes we will not soon use a 
foreigu description of a "novelty," either of 
flowers, fruits, or vegetables, without being care- 
ful to give the original describer credit for what 
