THE FLY AND THE FARMERS.
"The Hessian Fly is causing great alarm amongst the agriculturists. Its extinction is attracting the attention of the Faculty."—Daily Paper.
Catching Perch with a Fly.
Now we number the Potato
Beetle 'mong the scares gone by;
But a cuss has found its way to
Fields of corn—the Hessian Fly.
Unde derivatur "Hessian"?
Named from whence the fly had flown,
Under quite a wrong impression,
No such thing in Hesse's known.
Cecidomyia destructor,
(What long names have little things!)
Comes o'er Ocean by conductor;
Straw, pestiferous, pupæ, brings.
They turn, each, into a small gnat,
Not a blow-fly, bottle-blue;
Cecidomyia, vulgò, gall-gnat,
Galls both growths and growers too.
So the Farmers, full of trouble,
Help imploring go about,
They are told to burn the stubble;
No way else to stamp it out.
True the Chalcis is reputed,
On the Gall-gnat's grub to feed;
But, for service to be suited,
How that parasite can they breed?
Yet there is a vermin-killer,
Like to thin the dipterous pest,
To the farmer and the miller,
Which instruction may suggest.
What may be, the question narrows,
If they doubt they can but try,
Is, if let alone, the sparrows
Might keep down the Hessian Fly.
Bless his 'Art.—If there is anything in a name, the recently suggested appointment of Artin Effendi as Turkish Commissioner at Sofia ought to mean something. Certainly the situation is one demanding the exercise of no little diplomatic art. But the question is, whether the proposed Commissioner has got, as Robert would put it, his art in the business. There's the point.
A Pretty Kettle of Fish.—The Riots at Ostend.