218 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



ago by the prompt manner in which he responded to a number of enquiries, 

 and his readiness in undertaking the work of naming a large number of 

 species of Coleoptera. Dr. Leconte ever manifested a warm interest in 

 the Entomological Society of Ontario, and in the earlier volumes of our 

 Journal are many valuable articles from his pen. His Classification of the 

 Coleoptera of North America, pubHshed by the Smithsonian Institute in 

 1 86 1, was a great boon to those interested in the study of American 

 beetles, and greatly stimulated progress in this department, while the 

 many excellent monographs he has written of special families have been 

 invaluable to students. 



During the period of the war his scientific labors were interrupted by 

 pressing official duties. He was first appointed Surgeon of Volunteers, 

 and shortly afterwards Medical Inspector, with the rank of Lieutenant- 

 Colonel, which position he occupied for some years. Subsequently he 

 spent three years in Europe, where he visited all the public museums and 

 as many private ones as were accessible to him, which enabled him, with 

 the aid of a wonderful memory, to settle many doubtful points in reference 

 to species in his own cabinet. On his return he resumed his entomologi- 

 cal work, which was carried on with but slight interruption until within a 

 week or two of his death. His labors on the Rhyncophora resulted in 

 the publication of a volume of 455 pages, entitled, " Species of Rhyco- 

 phora," in which he was assisted by Dr. Horn. This was published as a 

 separate volume by the American Philosophical Society in 1876. Subse- 

 quently, in association with Dr. Geo. H. Horn, he prepared an entirely 

 new work to replace his early volume on the Classification of Coleoptera 

 of North America, in which the bulk of the families are re-arranged and a 

 vast amount of material, which has accumulated during the past twenty 

 years, utilized, and the whole brought into harmony with the present 

 advanced condition of knowledge on this subject. This work, which was 

 issued during the early part of the present year by the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tute, will prove a most valuable guide to students' of Coleoptera every- 

 where, and will, perhaps, be the most enduring monument of his life work. 

 No man who has ever lived has done as much as Dr. Leconte to advance 

 the study of Coleoptera in America ; and it has been well said that to 

 follow the papers he has written during his busy Hfe would be to give a 

 history of the progress of scientific Coleopterology in America. His 

 death will be a very great loss to American science, and an almost irre- 

 parable one to the special department in which he labored. 



