No. 145.] 
755 
insect depredators will be destroyed and the health of the tree 
promoted. These eggs hatch quite early, as soon as the buds 
begin to expand, and the young lice locate themselves upon the 
small, tender leaves, inserting their beaks therein and pumping 
out their juices. All of the lice thus hatched are females, and 
reach maturity in ten or twelve days. Without any intercourse 
of the sexes, the'e females that were produced from eggs, now 
commence giving birth to living young, bringing forth about two 
daily, for a period of two or three weeks, when, having become 
decrepid with age, they perish. The young mostly locate imme¬ 
diately around the parent, as closely as they can stow themselves. 
Upon a young leaf, in a space less than half an Inch long and the 
tenth of an inch wide, I counted thirty-six young lice and four 
winged females, which had recently alighted there to begin a new 
colony. The young reaching maturity after a similar length of 
time, in their turn become parents. Thus these vermin continue 
to breed, and as fast as new leaves expand they are in readiness 
to occupy them. When favorable circumstances attend them, 
their multiplication surpasses all power of computation. In the 
warmth of summer they attain maturity in less than half the time 
they do early in the spring. And like most of the species of the 
Aphides they at this period of the year produce winged as well 
as wingless females, the former dispersing themselves to found 
new colonies upon other trees. It is reported of the insects of 
this family, that there are from sixteen to twenty generations 
in the course of the season, from twenty to forty young being pro¬ 
duced from each parent. Thus, from one egg, as stated by Mr. 
Curtis, in seven generations, 729 millions of lice will be bred. 
And if they all lived their allotted length of time, by autumn 
everything upon the surface of the earth would be covered with 
them. When cold weather begins to approach, males as well as 
females are produced, and their operations for the season close 
with the deposit of a stock of eggs for continuing their species 
another year. On the last day of last October, it being a warm 
sunny day, after many nights of frost, I observed myriads of 
winged and apterous lice wandering about upon the trunks, the 
limbs and the fading leaves of all my apple trees, many of them 
occupied in laying their eggs. These were scattered along in 
