COLEOFTERA. 
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and of course would require many more of a smaller size. 
Say that, on an average of sizes, they consumed twenty 
apiece, these for the five make one hundred. Each of the 
parents consume say fifty; so that the pair and family devour 
two hundred every day. This, in three months, amounts to 
twenty thousand in one season. But as the grub continues 
in that state four seasons, this single pair, with their family 
alone, without reckoning their descendants after the first 
year, would destroy eighty thousand grubs. Let us suppose 
that the half, namely, forty thousand, are females, and it is 
known that they usually lay about two hundred eggs each, 
it will appear, that no less than eight millions have been 
destroyed, or prevented from being hatched, by the labors of 
a single family of jays. It is by reasoning in this way, that 
we learn to know of what importance it is to attend to the 
economy of nature, and to be cautious how we derange it by 
our short-sighted and futile operations.” Our own country 
abounds with insect-eating beasts and birds, and without 
doubt the more than abundant Melolonthae form a portion 
of their nourishment. 
We have several Melolonthians whose injuries in the perfect 
and grub state approach to those of the Eu¬ 
ropean cockchafer. Phyllophaga * quercina of 
Enoch, the May-beetle, as it is generally 
called here, is our common species. (Fig. 
10.) It is of a chestnut-brown color, smooth, 
' but finely punctured, that is, covered with 
j little impressed dots, as if pricked with the 
point of a needle; each wing-case has two or 
Fig. 10. 
* A genus proposed by me in 1826, It signifies leaf-eater. Dejean subse¬ 
quently called this genus Ancylonycha.^ 
[3 The genus Phyllophaya was indeed proposed by Dr. Harris, but was not 
accompanied by any description; it must therefore yield to the name Lachnosterna 
of Hope, described in 1837 Burmeister has improperly adopted for the genus the 
name given by Dejean, but which was not sanctioned by a description until 1845. 
It is a very niimerous genus, and many of the species resemble each other very 
closely. — Lec.] 
