24 REPORT 4, UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGIC-AXi COMMISSION. 
The insect was again destroyed by a storm, as we have seen happen less extensively 
several times since; the wind and rain beating them down, and the water sweeping 
them along and forming immense heaps in some places. 
Id 1S26 the destruction is said by Dr. Capers to have been again uni- 
versal, although other testimony to this fact is lacking. In limited 
localities the worms were noted in 1828, '29, '30, >31, '32, '33, '34, '35, 
and '3G. Considerable damage was occasionally done, but it was by 
no means general again until 1S3S, the worms that year spreading 
over nearly the # whole belt and doing especial damage in Florida and 
Southern Georgia. 
In 1834 the worms appeared for the first time in Texas, and in 1840 in 
Arkansas. This last year was one of quite general injury to the crop, 
northern Florida suffering particularly. In 1841 Florida again suffered, 
as also in 1843. In 1844 the marked feature was the severe damage in 
central and southern Louisiana. In this State there was a shortage of 
nearly 50 per cent, of the crop on account of the damage done by the 
caterpillars. In Mississippi and Alabama some little damage was done 
the same year ; but in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina the loss 
was almost nominal. 
In 1845 the damage was again considerable in Louisiana, and the 
other States suffered as well, the total loss from caterpillars being 
greater than in any other year since 1838. 
1840, hawever, overshadowed, perhaps, all previous cotton- worm 
years. The caterpillars appeared in force much earlier than they had 
ever been seen before, and from Texas to South Carolina hardly a plan- 
tation escaped without loss. In South Carolina old inhabitants say that 
the ruin of the crop was complete. In Florida more than half the total 
crop was lost. In Alabama the loss was nearly as great. In Mississippi 
and Louisiana on a general average one-third of the crop was destroyed. 
Writing to the American Agriculturist September 9, 184G, from Wash- 
ington, Miss., Mr. Thos. Affleck gives the following graphic account of 
the situation : 
The Caterpillar, Cotton "Worm, Cotton Moth (Xoctua xylina), or chenille of the 
French West Indies, Guiana, &c, has utterly blighted the hopes of the cotton-planter 
for the present year, and produced most anxious fears for the future. I have heard 
from the greater part of the cotton-growing region — the news is all alike — the worm 
has destroyed the crop. I have no idea that any considerable portion of any Slate 
will escape. * * * The present year the crop is unusually backward, at least four 
weeks later than usual. We have but just commenced picking; usually beginning 
about the last week in July or the first week in August. At this moment every field 
within this region of country, say south of Vicksburg, is stripped of everything but 
the stems, the larger branches, and a few of the first bolls, already too hard for the 
worms' power of mastication. The full-grown bolls not yet become hard are com- 
pletely eaten out, a circumstance I have never heard of but once before, in 1H-J5. The 
fie'ulN present a most melancholy appearance J looking from the blutf at -Natchez across 
the river to those fine plantations back of Vidalia, nothing is to be seen but the brown 
withered skeleton of the plant. 
