. The Gardeners' Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette . have been found in a neighbouringchurch, much to the annoyance of the incumbent, whois immediately going to close the church for cleansing. We further learn that at the commencement ofthe present week the insects were more numerousthan ever, and that turpentine does not appear tokill them. The Curate moreover writes, Theearth is full of them ; they come up and lay eggsin the crevices of the woodwork, and the heathatches them. I took off the capping of a pew,cleaned it, and applied to it gentle heat—half anhour produced two—cleaned it well a
. The Gardeners' Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette . have been found in a neighbouringchurch, much to the annoyance of the incumbent, whois immediately going to close the church for cleansing. We further learn that at the commencement ofthe present week the insects were more numerousthan ever, and that turpentine does not appear tokill them. The Curate moreover writes, Theearth is full of them ; they come up and lay eggsin the crevices of the woodwork, and the heathatches them. I took off the capping of a pew,cleaned it, and applied to it gentle heat—half anhour produced two—cleaned it well again, and in*20 minutes produced 45, and so on for severaltimes, till I saturated it with Benzine Collas, andthen no more came out. Specimens of the insects have been obliginglyfurnished to us by the architect as well as byMr. H. T. Stainton-, and we are thus able tostate that they are a species of Acarus veryclosely allied to the cheese mite. They are quitewhite, furnished with numerous long bristles,especially at the hind part of the body, and. with four pairs of jointed legs also sparinglyfurnished with shorter hairs. The head is tri-angular, opening with a longitudinal slit in themiddle, within which a pair of short points maybe seen at work under a very high power. Thegeneral appearance of the insect will be seen inthe middle figure in the accompanying illustra-tion : it is shorter and more robust than the cheeseand flour mites, and with longer hairs, and itsaverage length is about one-fiftieth of an the situation in which found, we may pro-pose to name it Acarus (Tyroglyphus) eccle-siasticus. What however is the origin of these myriads ofinsects ? We are informed of the fact that thevaults underneath the church have been recentlyopened, but that they have been generated fromthe corruption of the crumbling remains or fromthe malaria arising therefrom, is about as philoso-phical a suggestion as it would be to expect themto be created by electricity or that a c
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecad, booksubjecthorticulture, bookyear1859
