A GLIMPSE AT THE CABBAGE. 
59 
Halticci consobrina. (Blue cabbage flea or beetle) will perhaps 
be one of the best known among their numbers, abounding about 
May on the seedling cabbages. In shape it is elliptical. Above it is 
slightly depressed. In colour, dark blue, punctured. Antennae 
are rather long, the fourth and fifth joints being thickened in the 
male; wings, largish, dotted. Two hinder thighs stout; formed 
for leaping ; the two hinder feet are also longest. H. obscurella 
(Bastard turnip flea or beetle) is similar to the above with the 
exception of a brighter blue colour of the elytra. This species 
also does incalculable damage to the spring plants. Before 
leaving the beetles, I must not omit to notice the Ciirculionidce. 
This is one of the most extensive families among the Cohoptera , 
more than 10,000 species having already been discovered. 
They are commonly known as Weevils , a most destructive race, 
and are distinguished as follows :—Head produced into a long 
tapering snout on which the antennae are fixed, these latter being 
generally elbowed and clavate with the basal portion inserted in 
a groove ; Antennae generally twelve-jointed, incrassated with the 
basal joint, long, mandibles obtuse; blade and galea maxillae 
united ; tarsi four-jointed. The larvae are thick as a rule and 
slightly curled on themselves. Colour, white or yellow. Apod, 
or possessing only the rudiments of legs in the state of minute 
tubercules. Head strong with a leathery skin. Eyes generally 
absent. 
C. pleurostigma deposits eggs in the rind of the cabbage root ; 
these hatch beneath it, and the rind grows out as their size 
increases. When they are full fed they eat their Avay out to 
pupate in the earth. The imago makes its exit from the pupa in 
the spring and is in colour shining black, thickly punctured. . 
There is a channel down the snout, and deepish furrows on the 
elytra, with very short hairs between them. The thighs are 
toothed beneath. 
Yet another enemy to the cabbage !— Anthomyia brassicce (The 
Cabbage-fly.) This insect is scarcely one half the size of the 
common house-fly, but the amount of damage it is capable of 
doing is immense. It is to be seen throughout the summer 
months, and is of an ashy grey colour with three blackish streaks 
on the thorax ; the abdomen is linear with black stripes in the 
male, and entirely ashy-grey in the female ; wings clear. The 
larva is very much like the well-known (too much so) onion-fly 
(A. ceparum ), but is on the whole rather thicker, the last joint 
of the abdomen is truncated and surrounded by ten fleshy projec¬ 
tions, the four lower of which form pairs. Spiracles, reddish 
brown. Lives in the roots of cabbages eating away until full fed 
and causing the destruction of the cabbage by a slow process of 
rotting. The larvae may be found feeding even in the depth of 
winter, but warmth accelerates their metamophoses rapidly, and 
in June, eggs, larvae, pupae and imagos may be observed at the 
