120 
COLEOPTERA. 
The only method that occurs to me, by means of which 
we may get rid of them, when they are so numerous as to 
be seriously injurious to plants, is to brush them from the 
leaves into shallow vessels containing a little salt and water 
or vinegar. 
The habits of the Hispas, little leaf-beetles, forming the 
family Hispa das, were first made known by me in the year 
1835, in the “ Boston Journal of Natural History,” * where 
a detailed account of them, with descriptions of three native 
species, and figures of the larvae and pupae, may be found. 
The upper side of the beetles is generally rough, as the 
generical name implies. The larvae burrow under the skin 
of the leaves of plants, and eat the pulpy substance within, 
so that the skin, over and under the place of their opera- 
tions, turns brown and dries, and has somewhat of a blistered 
appearance, and within these blistered spots the larvae or 
grubs, the pupae, or the beetles may often be found. The 
eggs of these insects are little rough blackish grains, and 
are glued to the surface of the leaves, sometimes singly, and 
sometimes in clusters of four or five together. The grubs 
of our common species are about one fifth of an inch in 
length, when fully grown. The body is oblong, flattened, 
rather broader before than behind, soft, and of a whitish 
color, except the head and the top of the first ring, which 
are brown, or blackish, and of a horny consistence. It has 
a pair of legs to each of the first three rings ; the other 
rings are provided with small fleshy warts at the sides, and 
transverse rows -of little rasp-like points above and beneath. 
The pupa state lasts only about one week, soon after which 
the beetles come out of their burrows. 
The leaves of the apple-tree are inhabited by some of these 
little mining insects, which in the beetle state are probably 
the Hispa rosea f of Weber, or the rosy Hispa (Fig. 54). 
They are of a deep or tawny reddish-yellow color above, 
marked with little deep red lines and spots. The head is 
» Vol. I. p. m. 
t Hispa guadrata, Fabricius; II. marginala, Say. 
