CORN GROUND-BEETLE. 
45 
of young Wheat in this neighbourhood are seriously damaged, if not 
destroyed, by being bitten off in the soil; and, as far as I can make it 
out myself, the mischief is effected by the small brown worms, two of 
which I have sent in the box. The small white maggot was also 
found in the same position, and may also have had a share in the 
mischief. The brown ones are sometimes found partly inside the 
stalks, as if sucking the juices of the plant. As the effect will, I fear, 
be very disastrous, I thought it a matter of sufficient consequence to 
bring to your notice.” 
The following note, referring to the widespread injury caused 
by the grub, was sent from Winchester, on Feb. 18th, by Mr. J. Gill 
Comely:— 
“ An immense number of the worms, of which I take the liberty of 
sending you a few specimens, having appeared in the Wheat-plant in 
nearly all the land extending from Lymington to Beaulieu, and 
threatening to destroy the same, I venture to send a small box 
containing the same, and with hopes that you may be enabled 
(probably through Miss Ormerod) to inform me what is their name, 
and whether you are aware of any means by which their ravages can 
be either stopped or checked ; as otherwise they will have to be 
ploughed in, but with full expectation of appearing again in the 
following crop of whatever character. The appearance in the Wheat 
is the same as from the effect of Wireworm, but of which we do not 
find any; and it is the same, whether manured with farmyard-dung 
or any other manure. We have ring-rolled and heavily pressed the 
land, but only a few of them have been destroyed.” 
The specimens sent with the two preceding letters were certainly 
beetle-grubs, and of the class of ground-beetles (scientifically Geode- 
})hagous larva), and so much resembled those of the Zabrus gibbus, the 
Corn Ground-beetle, that it appeared almost impossible that they 
should be of any other kind; but as the Z. gibbus grub, when full- 
grown, is somewhat more than an inch in length, and the specimens 
sent me were then only about a quarter of an inch long, and 
(apparently from immaturity) still not fully coloured, they could not 
be identified with absolute certainty. 
The specimens I examined were long and narrow, lessening in 
width towards the tail, and with chestnut-brown heads, and with 
strong sickle-shaped jaws, toothed within. Above, there was a mark 
like a depression from back to front on each side of the centre of the 
upper part of the head. The three succeeding segments were brown 
and of liorn-like appearance above (the segment nearest the head being 
the longest). These three segments are each furnished with a pair of 
jointed legs, terminating in a point or claw. The following segments 
had a dark transverse patch on each above, divided into two parts by 
