A RASCALLY HUNCHBACK 207 
with their free-hand designs. After they have 
had a good bite of arsenate of lead naturally they 
do not care much about arts and crafts! The 
perpetrator of this careless deed is a wicked little 
humpbacked dwarf called the plum curculio. The 
word plum is a misnomer, as you can see by your 
collection. In truth, if any special name were to 
be given the hunchback, apricot curculio w r ould be 
the most fitting, as it really prefers the apricot 
to anything else. However, the first scientist to 
discover it found it doing excessive damage to 
plums, and plum curculio it became forthwith. 
The name has clung, notwithstanding that every 
one now knows that the little wretch works not 
only on all the stone fruits, but on the apple as 
well. 
“ The curculios spend the winter under fallen 
leaves and trash upon the ground, the most likely 
place being little gulleys and * pockets ’ where 
the leaves have drifted deep, and been thoroughly 
packed by the soaking fall rains. You might pry 
into such a den, and then never see the little 
hunchbacks unless you looked very, very closely. 
For they are dressed in a veritable tramp’s garb, 
so dingy and soiled that their general grayish- 
brown blends in well with their surroundings. 
Even such bright-eyed little people as the quail 
and chewink—our forest chickens—will scratch 
over and over in a well-populated bed and never 
