1883.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
339 
just heard that some boys stopped a little girl in 
the road not very far from here, and went so far as 
to strike her because she tried to save her roses. 
She is not sure who they were, as they were 
masked—being ashamed to show their faces.” 
May and Archie looked up at the doctor without 
speaking, and the other three boys looked at the 
floor and wished they could go through it into the 
cellar. “ I should so enjoy thrashing those mean, 
cowardly fellows,” continued Dr. Grey, “that I 
will gladly give a dollar bill to any one who tells 
me their names.” No one answered. “This 
money,” said the doctor, taking it out of his 
pocket, “ will buy a fine album and fifty foreign 
postage stamps at the shop next the post office. ” 
Archie had long wanted an album, but had not 
enough money to buy one. The other boys knew 
that, and trembled. But Archie had promised not 
to tell. The doctor waited a minute, and then, as 
no one spoke, he got up, but when .he reached the 
doorway, turned round, asking: “Well, does any 
one know the name of the boy who took the little 
girls’ part ?” 
“Archie Atwood ! It was Archie !” broke in May, 
joyfully, and a few minutes afterwards the sur¬ 
prised and happy boy was seated at the doctor’s 
side, driving merrily along to the shop next the 
post office. 
“ We’ll never, never be robbers again,” said the 
other three. Let us hope that they kept their word. 
The Doctor’s Talks. 
I am always glad to have you—which means 
girls as well as boys—write and tell me what you 
would like to have me “Talk” about. A young 
friend asks about insect changes. In a single line 
he wishes to know about 
Bees, Bugs, and Beetles. 
There is something so striking about the changes 
of insects from one form to another, that I do not 
wonder that they interest my young friends. What 
-'ig- 1 —THE STRAWBERRY FLY. 
fairy story caV^. '! of a more wonderful transfor¬ 
mation than ~t. - i a repulsive caterpillar, which 
feeds on our choR plants, to a butterfly, with its 
beautifully painted wings ? These changes, which 
all insects undergo, are not generally understood. 
Every insect (save some plant-lice which are born 
alive) 
Homes from an Egg, 
laid by a parent insect. They are not bred, as ig¬ 
norant persons suppose, by decaying substances. 
These only afford the parent insect an attractive 
place in which to lay her eggs. Nothing about in¬ 
sects is more wonderful than the way in which 
they provide for their young which they will never 
see ! The parent insect places her eggs just where 
the young, when hatched, will get the food they 
need. What is most wonderful, some bees sting 
other insects in such a manner as to stupefy, but 
not kill them, and place them in the cell where 
they lay the egg, that the young, when it hatches, 
may have something to feed upon. There are 
Seven Orders or Families of In¬ 
sects, 
which are grouped according to peculiarities of 
their wings. As we have started with “ Bees, 
Bugs, and Beetles,” we will keep to these, except 
to say that the most showy and noticable family, 
that which contains the 
Butterflies and Motlis, 
is called the Lepidoptera, a word which means 
“scale-winged.” If you touch a butterfly or a 
moth, a fine dust will leave the wings and stick to 
your fingers. If you examine this apparent dust 
with a microscope, you will find it made up of 
beautiful but very minute scales, some of which 
look like feathers. But we may talk of these an¬ 
other time ; let us now keep to the three kinds 
with which we started. Firstly, let us under¬ 
stand that every insect, of every kind, goes through 
certain changes. The entomologist calls these, 
Egg, Lavra, Chrysalis, and Imago, 
The egg being laid, the parent usually dies. The 
egg hatches, and we give the young the various 
names of grub, maggot, and caterpillar. In com¬ 
mon language, inseats in this state are generally 
called “worms,” though they are nothing like 
proper worms. It is in their larval or “ worm ” 
state that injurious insects, as a general thing, do 
their mischief, for then they make their growth, 
and are great feeders. When the larva has grown 
to its full size, it usually goes to rest for a longer 
or shorter time. It often spins itself a web, some¬ 
times it makes a place in the ground, or it may 
merely throw off its last skin, and appears in a 
very different shape from its former one. After 
remaining for a time in this condition, in which it 
is called 
Chrysalis or Pupa, 
its skin is broken, and it comes out as the Imago, 
or perfect insect. What can be more unlike the 
repulsive “ worm ” of the parsley than the beauti¬ 
ful black butterfly that grows from it, with its 
yellow and blue spots? The fairy who, in the 
story, made Cinderella’s chariot out of a pump¬ 
kin, did not work a more wonderful transformation. 
Bees, Wasps, Ants, etc., 
are classed by entomologists as Hymenoptera, a 
word which means “membrane-winged.” They 
have four wings, the upper 
pair usually much larger 
than the lower. These in¬ 
sects are often provided 
■with stings, as many a boy 
who has disturbed a “yel¬ 
low-jacket’s ” nest knows 
to his sorrow. The insects 
of this family are regarded 
as the most intelligent of 
all. They provide for fu¬ 
ture wants by laying up 
stores of honey, etc., and 
often live in communities, 
where each works for the 
common good. The en¬ 
graving, fig. 1, shows an 
insect, the larva of which feeds on the leaves 
of strawberry plants. This is given to show the 
general appearance of insects of this family. 
The Bags.— \\hat is a Bug ? 
In common language, most insects are “ bugs,” 
just as most larvae are “worms.” But the true 
bugs form a family by themselves, the Hemiptera, 
a word which means “half-winged.” Some very 
unpleasant insects belong to this family, the 
Fig. 3.— YOUNG STAGES OF CHINCH-BUG. 
Squasli-bug, the Bed-bug, and that insect often so 
destructive in the grain fields, the Chinch-bug. 
They have beaks, by means of which they suck the 
juices from plants, and thus kill them. In the 
larval state they are not very much unlike their 
perfect condition, as shown in figure 2. Figure 3 
gives the Chinch-bug at various ages. 
The Beetles 
make up the family of Coleoptera, a word which 
may be translated as “shield-winged” insects. 
Their larval state, usually that of a soft grub, is 
very unlike that of the perfect insect. How un¬ 
like is the June-beetle, or Dor-bug (fig. 4), which 
bounces about the room on summer evenings, to 
the lazy, fat “ White-grub,” fig. 5, that is turned 
up by the plow or spade ! This insect lives under¬ 
ground for three years in the grub state, feeding 
on roots, and at length appears as a beetle. The 
Fig. 4.— JUNE-BEETLE. Fig. 5.— TnE WHITE- GRUB. 
destructive Colorado-beetle or “ Potato-bug,” of 
the same family, undergoes its changes in a few 
weeks. 
I hope that my young friends will watch the 
various insects they meet with, and observe their 
changes. They will find that all insects are not 
injurious. Among the beetles, for example, the 
Lady-bugs are useful, especially in the larval state, 
when they destroy plant-lice and other injurious 
insects. The Doctor. 
The Tadpole and the Caterpillar. 
BY AGNES CARR. 
In a shallow pond, where white and yellow water 
lilies spread their green “ pads ” on the top of the 
blue water; there once lived a jolly little tadpole, 
with a very round body and a flat tail; and he was 
as merry as the day was long ; chasing the flies 
that skimmed along on the surface of the pond, 
and playing “ hide and seek ” with the minnows 
in and out of the long twining lily stems. Every 
morning, a fat little caterpillar, who lived on the 
top of a bank near by, came down to make a call, 
and they were the best of friends, together with a 
snail, who took a daily walk up and down the 
shore, carrying her tiny house on her back, being 
afraid to leave it at home for fear of robbers. The 
tadpole’s name was Thaddeus Pollywog, and the 
caterpillar’s Catherine Grub ; but they were always 
called Taddy and Catty for short; while the snail 
was known as Moll, or Moll Lusk. 
One fine moruing, these three friends were warm¬ 
ing themselves in the sun.—Taddy, floating on the 
top of the water; Catty sitting on a stone, and 
Moll Lusk lying on the sand at the very edge of 
the pond. They had been very quiet for some 
time, watching the white clouds that drifted across 
the blue sky ; when the snail suddenly popped up 
her head, waved her horns and said : “ I have been 
thinking,” she said, “ how much better off I am 
than richer of you. Taddy cannot come out of the 
watei- or walk ; Catty cannot leave the land or 
swim ; while I can do both. Then too, I have this 
nice shell, which I can use either as a house or 
a boat. Do you not wish you were both snails ?” 
—“No, indeed,” said Taddy, “I should not like to 
drag that heavy thing wherever I went, at all. But 
I would like to have a pair of legs so I could jump 
up the bank, and see what is on the other side.”— 
“ I would rather have wings, and fly wherever I 
wished,” said Catty, “ like that dragon-fly over 
there. I wonder where she got them.”—“I don’t 
know ; wish I did,” said Taddy, turning a somer¬ 
sault, and landing on his head, which made Catty 
laugh until her sides ached.—“Suppose we go to 
my cousin, the crab, and ask him,” said the snail, 
“ he knows everything.”—“ All right,” said Taddy, 
“ and perhaps, too, he can tell me how to get a pair 
of legs.” So saying, he darted off, and was half¬ 
way around the pond before the snail and cater¬ 
pillar had gone two inches, and had to wait for 
them to come up. Moll and Catty walked very 
slowly, for the snail was stiff, and had a load to 
I 
Fig. 2. 
MATURE CHINCH-BUG. 
