The Army-worm (larva of _Leucania unipunctata_ of Haworth), during this our great rebellion, is thought, by many persons in Western Pennsylvania, to prognosticate the success or defeat of our armies by the direction it travels. If toward the North, the South will be victorious; and if toward the South, the North will conquer. An old gentleman, who believes that a frog’s foot drawn in chalk above the door will keep away witches, tells me this worm invariably travels southward. This larva was noticed but a few years before the war began, and then appearing, as it were, in armies, it was called the Army-worm. The superstitious omen from it has followed not preceded the name. Lindenbrog, in his Codex Legum Antiquarum, cum Glossario, fol. Francof. 1613, mentions the following superstition: “The peasants, in many places in Germany, at the feast of St. John, bind a rope around a stake drawn from a hedge, and drive it hither and thither, till it catches fire. This they carefully feed with stubble and dry wood heaped together, and they spread the collected ashes over their potherbs, confiding in vain superstition, that by this means they can drive away Canker-worms. They therefore call this Nodfeur, q. _necessary fire_.” These fires were condemned as sacrilegious, not as if it had been thought that there was anything unlawful in kindling a fire in this manner, but because it was kindled with a superstitious design. They are, however, Du Cange says, still kindled in France, on the eve of St. John’s day.[859] Geometridæ--Span-worms. The Measuring-worm, crawling on your clothes, is thought to foretell a new suit; on your hands, a pair of gloves, etc. Tineidæ--Clothes’-moth, Bee-moth, etc. In Newton’s Journal of the Arts for December, 1827, there is the following mention of a new kind of cloth fabricated by insects: The larvæ of the Moth, _Tinea punctata_, or _T. padilla_, have been directed by M. Habenstreet, of Munich, so as to work on a paper model suspended from a ceiling of a room. To this model he can give any form and dimensions, and he has thus been enabled to obtain square shawls, an air balloon four feet high, and a woman’s complete robe, with the sleeves, but without seams. One or two larvæ can weave a square inch of cloth. A great number are, of course, employed, and their motions are interdicted from the parts of the model not to be covered, by oiling them. The cloth exceeds in fineness the lightest gauze, and has been worn as a robe over her court dress by the Queen of Bavaria.[860]