Principal household insects of the United States . -culiarities of habit which will be referredto later. The peculiar appearance of thecommon silver fish early drew attentionto it, and a fairly accurate description ofit, given in a little work published inLondon in 1(365 by the Royal Society, isinteresting enough to reproduce: It is a small, silvery, shining worm or moth which I fonnd much conversant .amongbooks and papers, and is supposed to he that which corrodes and eats holes throughthe leaves and covers. It appears to the naked eye a small, glittering, pearl-coloredmoth, which, upon the r
Principal household insects of the United States . -culiarities of habit which will be referredto later. The peculiar appearance of thecommon silver fish early drew attentionto it, and a fairly accurate description ofit, given in a little work published inLondon in 1(365 by the Royal Society, isinteresting enough to reproduce: It is a small, silvery, shining worm or moth which I fonnd much conversant .amongbooks and papers, and is supposed to he that which corrodes and eats holes throughthe leaves and covers. It appears to the naked eye a small, glittering, pearl-coloredmoth, which, upon the removing of hooks and papers in the summer, is often observedvery nimbly to scud and pack away to some lurking cranny where it may betterprotect itself from any appearing dangers. Its head appears big and blunt, and itsbody tapers from it toward the tail, smaller and smaller, being shaped almost like On account of its always shunning the light and its ability to runvery rapidly to places of concealment, it is not often seen and is most i. Fu 32.—Lepisma (original). adult- Micrographia, R. Hooke, London, 1665. SPECIES INJURIOUS TO WALL PAIKU, HOOKS, ETC. 77 \ difficult to capture, and being clothed wiili smooth, glistening scales, ifwill slip from between the fingers and is almost impossible to securewithout crushing or damaging. It is one of the most serious pests inlibraries, particularly to the binding of books, and will frequently eatoftthe gold lettering to get at the paste beneath, or, as reported byMr. I. K. LThler, of Baltimore, often gnaws off white Blips glued on thebacks of books. Eeavily glazed paper Beemsvery attractive bo thisinsect, and it has frequently happened thai the labels in museum col-lections have been disfigured or destroyed by it, the glazed surfacehaving been entirelyeaten off*. In somecases books printed onheavily sized paperwill have the surfaceof the leaves a gooddeal scraped, leavingonly the portions cov-ered by the i
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectinsectp, bookyear1896
