However strange and unnatural it may appear, that the same insect should resort to a nidus so different as a fruit and the bark of a tree, still the testimony is too strong to the fact, to leave it longer in doubt. My own experiments have removed all the misgivings of my own mind. Dr. Fitch, in his lecture on the Curculio, at New Haven, last year, admits the fact, and seems only at a loss to know how to account for the knot itself, and supposes it to be like the cancer in the human body. The Doctor seemed to have forgotten that hundreds of insects deposit their eggs in the bark of the bodies, branches, and twigs of trees; in the veins, skin, or parenchyma of the leaves, or on the stems of the leaves - and at once, as if by magic, there arises around that egg a balloon, a ball, or a warty excrescence, that affords the double purpose of protecting and feeding the growing insect.

We must not only have a season without any fruit, but the trees also must be destroyed before we can hope to be rid of the Curculio, for want of a nidus in which to deposit her egg. But it may be asked, what is the proof of all this 1

I have seen the Curculio making the crescent mark upon the tree. I have watched day after day, and seen the growth of the knot round that mark. I have seen the gum exude from the orifice. I have taken the mil-grown larvae from those knots, and could distinguish no difference between them and the larvae taken from the Plums. I have placed them in vessels filled with earth, and kept them separate from others, and watched them during the progress of transformation. They go the same distance under the ground, make the same kind of a cell in the earth, assume the pupa condition in precisely the same way, and come out the perfect insect in the same time. You may examine the two either with or without a glass, and there is no apparent difference. Mix them together, and you can not separate them. Thus, I think it may be considered as fully proved, that the same insect that punctures our fruit causes the black knot on the Plum tree also. It seems both strange and unnatural, but the insect world is full of wonders.

The knots on certain kinds of Cherry trees are somewhat different, and are caused by another insect of the same class. The knot on the Plum tree is a warty excrescence one side, while that on the Cherry envelops or surrounds the branch. Neither are the grubs found in the same situation; in the Cherry it is usually in the pith or heart of the twig.

I have stated that the rot sometimes so destructive to the Plum crop is caused also by the Curculio. Some persons will dispute this proposition, and tell you that it is the weather only. I admit that the weather has much to do with it. A crop of Plums will be destroyed much sooner in hot, wet weather (what is called dog-day weather) than when the atmosphere is dry and pure. I have seen beautiful crops of fruit almost ready for the market, and when the owner was congratulating himself that he was out of danger, disappear in a few days; and this is more often the case with those kinds that grow in clusters and where many touch each other. The experienced fruit grower will watch his trees closely at this season; where he sees a plum decayed, or only a speck upon it, he will carefully punch it off with a pole, and if his experience is like mine, he will find, that in the center of where the decay commenced, will be the crescent mark of the Curculio. If that plum remains upon the tree, all the others that touch it, either directly or indirectly, will rot also sooner or later, according to the weather. Where the eggs of the curculio are deposited in Plums so nearly grown that the pits are becoming hard, they seldom hatch.

I suppose the acid of the fruit at this time destroys the egg, and it in turn becomes a poison to the fruit. This is my theory, and whether true or not, the destruction of our Plum crops is sometimes so great from this cause, as to call for the closest attention. Watch your trees every day, take off every specked plum at once; some even now will be found to have the grubs of the curculio in them: be careful to destroy them.

In neighborhoods where the Curculio has undisputed possession, as in most parts of this State, since the great crops of peaches, the numbers that can be taken in this way, in the early part of the season, will be almost incredible.

Some have said that the Pea-bug is the same as the Curculio, and they certainly look very much alike, but any one who will try them by the crushing process between the thumb and finger will know that they belong to different classes of insects.

If you have determined to save your fruit from the Curculio, watch your trees often. If you have some promising fruits in your gardens, run out with your small sheet before breakfast, and give your trees a tap; if you find any then, go again before you attend to business; run out before dinner and before tea. As your beautiful fruits grow and promise such luxuries in the autumn, you will become more and more interested, until, like Scott's Blinkhoolie, in the Abbott, you will come to think no life so pleasant as that passed among the Pears, the reaches, and the Plums of your fruit garden. There is nothing so beautiful to adorn your dinner-table, after the substantial part has been disposed of, as the fruits taken from your own garden; and if you have more than you want for your own use, what is there to compare with the fruits of your own raising, to give away?

If all the fruit that falls from all the varieties of fruit trees could be eaten by our hogs, or gathered by hand and destroyed before the grubs have escaped into the ground, the curculio question would soon be effectually settled. This is an eminently practical view of the subject. An individual may do this, or it may be possible in some places to carry out a neighborhood combination; but anything further than this is hardly to be hoped for, and unless Providence interferes, the curculio is likely to continue to be one of the great trials of the fruit growers' life.