No. 145.J 
741 
to believe they were anything else than white dots natural to the 
% smooth young bark, until by careful watching some of them could 
be perceived to be moving about upon the bark. 
When first hatched from the egg the larva is but about half the 
size of the egg, of an oval form and a pale dull yellow color. 
Three pairs of legs are perceptible, two placed anteriorly, the 
other posteriorly and distant. It walks about with much life and 
agility. I have not traced this insect through the subsequent 
stages of its life with sufiicient accuracy of observation to give its 
history. 
A number of remedies for the bark-louse will be found report¬ 
ed in late volumes of the Prairie Farmer and other western agri¬ 
cultural, papers. The secret remedy which was hawked through 
that section, as perfectly sure of destroying these lice, was simply 
an infusion of quassia, with which the trees were to be wet from 
a syringe or watering pot. This of course was soon discovered 
to be worthless, or effectual only when applied to the young new¬ 
ly hatched lice, at which time infusion of tobacco or soap suds 
would be a more economical and still more effectual remedy. 
These, and also strong lye, potash water, whitewash, dry ashes, 
sulphur, and I know not how many more articles have been re¬ 
commended by different writers. In a late number of the Michi¬ 
gan Farmer (vol. 13. p. 82,) A. G. Hanford gives a very favorable 
account of the effects of tar and linseed oil, beat together and ap¬ 
plied warm with a paint brush thoroughly, before the buds begin 
to expand in the spring. This, when dry, cracks and peels off, 
bringing off the dead scales with it. Trees which were thus 
treated grew from ifoo to two and a half feet last summer, which 
had advanced only a few inches in previous years. The remedy 
to which Esq. Kimball, of Kenosha, resorts is probably one of the 
most efficacious, and as convenient as any; he boils leaf tobacco 
in strong lye till it is reduced to an impalpable pulp, which it 
will be in a short time, and mixes with it soft soap, (which has 
been made cold; not the jelly-like boiled soap,) to make the mass 
about the consistence of thin paint, the object being to obtain a 
preparation that will not be entirely washed from the tree by the 
first rains which occur, as lye, tobacco water, and most other 
