- 3 6- 



well equipped for the work of instruction had already made con- 

 siderable provision for carrying on investigations in economic 

 entomology ; and two reports on insects injurious to vegetation 

 had been published by the station. 



The equipment available at that time for the work of the sta- 

 tion consisted of a comparatively good entomological library, 

 microscopes, breeding-cages and other apparatus for the study of 

 insects, and an extensive collection of named specimens. 



Great care and considerable expense had been devoted to the 

 building up of this collection. For, owing to the large number of 

 species of insects in our fauna, no entomologist can be expected 

 to know more than a very small proportion of them. And when 

 insects are received for determination, it would often be very dif- 

 ficult to name the specimens if we had no collection of named 

 insects with which to compare them. 



In the course of making this collection we have received the 

 generous aid of a large proportion of the more prominent entomol- 

 ogists of this country in determining the specimens. In the case 

 of nearly every order of insects, the specimens illustrating that 

 order in our collection have been determined by the highest au- 

 thority on the American representatives of that order. We can, 

 therefore, feel reasonably sure that the determinations are accurate. 



In some respects our collection is a remarkable one. Thus of 

 the Coccidae or Scale insects, one of the most important of families 

 from an economic standpoint, we have the largest collection in 

 existence. And of the entire Order Hcmiplera, or bugs, our col- 

 lection of the American forms is better than that possessed hy any 

 other institution in the country. In several other groups our col- 

 lection though not comparatively so important as in the groups 

 just mentioned, is really quite extensive. In fact if we except 

 the great collections at Cambridge and Philadelphia, that of Cor- 

 nell University holds a high place among those of this country. 

 The enlargement of the scope of the work of the station rendered 

 possible by the support given it hy the provisions of the Hatch 

 Act necessitated an increase in its equipment. In the work which 

 we had been doing in the study of insects, we had been seriously 

 embarrassed by the lack of a suitable place in which insects could 

 be studied while actively infesting growing plants, and where ex- 

 periments in the destruction of insects could be tried. A place 

 was needed where all of the conditions of growth of both plants 



