THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 175 



chromo-lithographic plates ; and to Reports on several orders of insects 

 by Chambers, Grote, Hagen, Osten-Sacken, Packard, Scudder, Thomas 

 and Uhler, in the Annual Reports and the Bulletins of the Hayden Survey 

 of the Territories. 



The liberality displayed by our Government in the publication and 

 gratuitous distribution to those whose scientific labors render them worthy 

 recipients, of investigations in other departments of Natural Science — in 

 Geology, Palaeontology, Mammalogy, Ornithology, Ichthyology, Botany, 

 etc., deserves our most earnest commendation. The facility of publica- 

 tion thus afforded to meritorious work almost evokes the envy of some 

 of our European friends. 



In conclusion, permit me to commend to the members of the Club 

 the biological study of our insect forms. It is attractive, it is simple in 

 many of its phases, it is of great practical utility, it is a field where all can 

 find abundant work, and one in which some of those questions which are 

 engaging the attention of zoologists in other departments, may best find 

 their most ready answer. Let no one be satisfied with the simple posses- 

 sion of a large and well arranged cabinet of insects. If to collect and 

 own it be a source of pleasure, often beyond expression, then science may 

 demand at his hands that he should aid in extending its boundaries in 

 return : and in no better way can this be done than in working out the 

 life histories of our species, beginning with those with which we hold the 

 more intimate relationship. Let descriptions of forms remain, except in 

 exceptional cases, for those who have special fitness and opportunity for 

 the work ; and systemization for him who, like the poet, nascitur non 

 fit, that kaleidoscopic manipulation of genera and the higher groups may 

 cease to bewilder, perplex and dismay. 



In illustration of what may be done in the study that I commend to 

 you, I would refer to the labors of Mr. W. H. Edwards in working out 

 the histories of some of those butterflies which appear under different 

 forms at different seasons of the year. Some of the results are known to 

 you, and I am sure that you regard them as among the most valuable 

 recent contributions to Entomology. The untiring zeal with which the 

 work has been prosecuted and is being continued, deserves the com- 

 mendation which it has received from the most eminent European Ento- 

 mologists, and the success with which it has been crowned. 



Gentlemen, I trust that our assemblage at this time may not only con- 

 duce to the interests of our science, but also render its pursuit more 



