OF INSECTS IN GENERAL. 
3*5 
dilcover a mode of preventing fuch devaftations, would 
certainly deferve well of his country and of mankind, by 
communicating information that tended fo directly to the 
public good. 
The tar extracted from coal by that ingenious noble- 
man the Earl of Dundonald, when better known, will 
probably be found an efficacious remedy againlt the cor- 
rofions of wood by infe£ts in all cafes where it can be 
applied. It not only penetrates fo deeply into wood that 
it cannot be waffied away ; but is of fo acrid a fubitance, 
as mud inevitably deltroy worms. The intolerable ef- 
fluvia which it emits, will, however, prevent its appli- 
cation in the cafe of houfehold furniture. 
The pernicious genus of phaleena, which contains all 
the different fpecies of moths, makes Hill nearer ap- 
proaches to man in the hoftilities which it commits. No 
perfon is ignorant of the defiru&ive quality of tliefe in- 
feels to woollen cloth, and all kinds of fur and wearing 
apparel. The aflonifhing inftinft of thefe animals, in 
providing a proper receptacle for their eggs, and food for 
their young, have not withdrawn that indefatigable en- 
tymclogift Re au mure, from deviling efficacious methods 
of preventing their depredations upon woollen fluffs and 
furs *. 
Of fuch vaft extent are the mifehiefs occafioned by the 
infedl tribe upon the various objects of human induflry, 
and the neceffaries of life ; all thefe, however, would in 
a manner dtfappear, were we to refleil upon their dan- 
gerous effedls upon the human body, and the hulbatid- 
man’s attention would be withdrawn from the depreda- 
tions committed on his fields, did he imagine that thou- 
* Vide Mem. de l’Acad. 1728. 
R r a lands 
