42 
THE ELOEIST AND POMOLOQIST. 
[ February, 
existence. Mr. B. S. Williams, to whom we are indebted for it, and who 
exhibited it at Bath under the garden name of A. elegantissimum, is not able to 
give any clue as to its origin, and wo can, therefore, only conclude that it has appeared as a 
spore-sport or a spore-hybrid in gardens. Its fronds are about a foot in length, and some 8 in. 
or 9 in. across the widest part. They are very distinctly five times pinnate, the ultimate 
pinnules standing wide apart on their rachis, and having a distinct stalk, while they measure 
from about one-sixteenth to one-eighth of an inch in length, very few, indeed, being larger, 
these and a few of the longer ones being generally cut into about two or three shallow 
lobes ; many of them, however, are not lohed, but have at the top a slit or sinus, at the base 
of which the orbicular indusium is situated, so that the sinus is completely filled out. The 
texture of the frond is very thin and fragile, and its colour is a very pale yellowish-tinted 
olive-green. The multiplicity of minute pinnules, and the almost invisible ramifications 
of the rachis, give the plant a peculiarly charming appearance. 
- ®HE Colorado Potato Beetle has been devastating tbe Potato crops of 
North America, and it is to be feared may extend its ravages to other countries. 
It is an inhabitant of the Eocky Mountains, where it feeds on a wild Solanum, 
but no sooner did the Solanum tuberosum come within its reach, than the insect attacked it 
greedily, and soon spread over the country. This beetle propagates with extraordinary 
rapidity. The first batch of larvae appears towards the end of May, or, if the weather be mild, 
of April. The female loses no time in depositing from 700 to 1,200 eggs, in clusters of twelve 
or thirteen, on the under-side of a leaf. Within five or six days, according to the state of the 
weather, the larvae escape from the egg, and begin their work of devastation, which goes on 
for some seventeen 
days, when the little 
creatures retire below 
the soil, in order to 
undergo the pupal 
condition. After a 
delay of ten or foui*- 
toen days, the perfect 
insect comes into 
being, and the busi¬ 
ness of egg - laying 
commences anew. In 
this way, according 
to recent observa¬ 
tions, three broods 
follow each other; 
the last wintering 
below the surface of 
the ground. No des¬ 
cription can do jus¬ 
tice to the marvellous 
voracity of this insect, 
especially in its lar¬ 
val state. When once 
a field of potatos has 
been attacked, it is in a few days changed into an arid waste. Moreover, the beetle in its 
different stages is so entirely unaffected by the extremes of heat and cold, of wet and dry, 
which it has met with in America, that it may be expected to care as little for the changes 
of climate which occur in the temperate zone of Europe, and once settled, will quickly be¬ 
come naturalized. Hand-pieking is the only remedy yet discovered, but even this requires 
caution, as the juice of the crushed insect blisters the skin. The eggs are of a deep orange- 
yellow ; the larvae are, at first, of a blackish hue, which passes quickly into a dark red, with a 
slight orange tint, but on attaining their full size the colour varies between orange, reddish- 
yellow, and flesh. We have to thank the publisher of Science Gossip for the use of the woodcut. 
- ^ Second Edition of Lindley and Moords Treasury of Botany has 
recently been published by Messrs. Longmans, with such emendations as it was 
practicable to make in the stereotyped text. A supplement contains articles on 
various genera previously omitted, or published since the issue of the first edition, together 
Colorado Potato Beetle. 
