ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 



PHILADELPHIA, PA., MARCH, 1921. 



The Influence of Insects on Human History. 



The United States Department of Agriculture has recently 

 issued Department Circular 163 (from the Bureau of Ento- 

 mology), entitled Dispersion of the Boll Weevil in 1920, by B. 

 R. Coad and R. W. Moreland. It states, among other things : 



The outstanding feature of the weevil movement during 1920 has 

 been its retardation in the eastern portion of the cotton belt. For many 

 years the most important movements took place east of the Mississippi 

 River, but during 1920 there was comparatively little gain in that sec- 

 tion. By far the most significant change is the dispersion in Okla- 

 homa and Texas by which a large territory infested a number of years 

 ago, but uninfested for the past five or six years, has been regained 

 by the weevil. 



A table shows the areas gained by the weevil in 1920 to have 

 been 7749 square miles in Texas, 19,695 in Oklahoma, 4567 

 in Arkansas, 869 in Tennessee, 1603 in Georgia, 3266 in South 

 Carolina, 4120 in North Carolina, a total of 41,869 square 

 miles. As there are no losses to offset this, it appears that the 

 total area in the United States infested by the weevil in 1920 

 was 534,109 square miles, compared with 492,240 square miles 

 in 1919. 



The subject of the influence of insects upon human civiliza- 

 tion has never been adequately treated. We hope that some 

 day some one of insight and of genius will follow this influence 

 into all its ramifications, showing how the boll-weevil, the 

 disease-carrying mosquitoes, the grasshopper and the locust, 

 the insects destroying cereals and forest trees have had their 

 part in the downfall of states and of empires all from the 

 standpoint, not of the entomologist, but of the historian of 

 man. When this is done we shall have some ground for ex- 

 pecting that the value and importance of Entomology will be 

 appreciated justly. 



90 



