6o 
THE NATURALISTS’ JOURNAL. 
same period. The pupa is of a bright brownish-red colour, and 
of a horny appearance. It is found in the roots where the larvse 
are fed. There are several tubercles at the head, and small teeth 
at the tail. 
Among the aphides, small in size but incomputable in number, 
I shall only take up your time in introducing one—the cabbage- 
leaf plant-louse {Aphis brassicce). This destructive insect is 
especially partial to the savoys, though in some seasons it 
abounds equally as much on other varieties. They are found 
underneath the leaves from July to the end of October, sometimes 
indeed to the end of November. All the females will be noticed 
with their young broods, the males meanwhile wandering rest¬ 
lessly about. These insects multiply exceedingly fast but a check 
is placed on them by other insects such as the lady-bird and its 
larvae, ant-lions, the larvae of Syrphus , etc., or what the conse¬ 
quences would be it is astounding to think. 
The male of the A. brassicce is light green in colour, the head 
and back of trunk being black. The antennae are seven-jointed. 
Body indiscriminately spotted with brownish black. Wing 
nervures deep black and distinct. Apical cell oval. Stigma green. 
Legs black. Thighs green at their junction with body. The 
female is of a yellowish green colour and mealy white on back 
with some irregular spots of black or brownish black. Antennae 
not so long as those in the male, black, with the two basal joints 
green and third ochreous. Body fat and repulsive. Legs black 
with base of thighs green as the male. 
There are also two moths that in their larval state do much 
towards laying waste and rendering useless the cabbage, and 
which, in their imago state, are well known to the veriest tyro 
who has collected insects. I refer to the Plusia gamma (Gamma 
or Silvery moth) and the Mamestra brassicce (Cabbage moth). 
The former has a lilac tinge on its marbled dark greyish-brown, 
metallic looking fore-wings. Near the outer border is a golden 
or silvery shining mark of a shape very closely resembling the 
Greek letter Gamma on which account it received its specific 
name. It flies in the hot sunshine as well as night. The cater¬ 
pillar is green, with several white lines along the back, and a 
yellow one along the sides. It is also slightly hairy. The egg 
from which it springs is beautifully sculptured, and the pupa to 
which it changes later on is black, enclosed in a thin woolly web. 
The larvae commit their depredations from spring to autumn. 
The Mamestra brassiccc .—Cabbage-moth—a pest in some places, 
unwelcome everywhere, has its upper wings of a mottled brown 
colour clouded with a darker tinge of the same and with wavy 
black lines. Near the margin is an ear-shaped mark spotted 
with white and near to this a circular pale spot. Towards the 
fringe is a wavy yellow line, the fringe itself being dotted with 
black and ochre. The eggs, deposited in May, June or July, 
