182 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



We next come to the practical part of a most practical subject : the needs of 

 economic entomology. The first need of which we shall speak is that of 

 purely scientific investigation ; a need which entomology shares with chemis- 

 try, botany, — in fact, with all the sciences. It was this need that the immortal 

 Agassiz advocated so eloquently, and with such telling effect as to lead to the 

 establishment, maintenance, and wondrous growth of the great Agassiz Mu- 

 seum, and to the founding by private enterprise of the school on Penikese 

 Island. And who shall say but that his eloquent appeal in behalf of scientific 

 research in the beautiful city of the Golden Gate led to the munificent be- 

 quests of Mr. James Lick ? 



How earnestly, too, did Prof. Tindall urge bequests in this same direction iu 

 his last address in America, and how well did he show his faith by his works, 

 in devoting the large amount acquired by his lecturing tour in this country 

 entirely to the promotion of what he so eloquently advocated. 



So great is the lack in this direction that many of our most common objects 

 have never yet been fully irvestigated. That most common of all animals, the 

 house-fly, though found in all countries, and though so well known as ao 

 imago, never had its life-history fully investigated till about a year since, the 

 offering of the " Walker Prize" for its fullest and ablest investigation called 

 forth from Dr. Packard a very complete monograph of its development, history, 

 transformations and habits. Prof. Riley has been teaching for several years 

 that the common cotton-worm moth (A?iomis xylina, Say), that terrible 

 scourge of our southern States, hibernated in those regions during the winter 

 as an imago or moth. Mr. A. R. Grate, one of our first scientific entomolo- 

 gists, having observed for several years in Alabama, states that the moth can 

 not endure so rigid a climate as that of the cotton States ; that they all die 

 off*, and each year suffers from a fresh immigration from regions further south. 

 If ignorance and doubt are so apparent among the most common and familiar 

 insects, what shall we say of the thousands which are never seen or dreamed 

 of, — though often working the most dire injuries — except by the eager, observ- 

 ing entomologist. Hence we see that both field work and work in the study are 

 crying aloud for laborers. In respect to scientific investigation we are far be- 

 hind France, Germany, and even England, where the most able and experi- 

 enced scientists are employed by government to the almost exclusive work of 

 original investigation in science ; and could our governments, state and na- 

 tional, be certain of obtaining the right men, they could adopt no wiser policy 

 than that of keeping them engaged in just such important labor, for only as 

 the results of such labor shall we know the nature of "yellows," blight, scab, 

 etc., etc. Short-sighted indeed are those agricultural writers and others who 

 scoff" at the Bussey Institute and agricultural department of Yale College, even 

 though no student should ever darken the halls of either institution, so long as 

 the able i:)rofessor3 continue in such important investigations as at present 

 engage their attention. 



Personal observation and careful experiments by the most scientific and cul- 

 tured entomologists is a most pressing need, and that, too, right here in our 

 own State. The first demands visits, for the purpose of investigation, to every 

 part of the State, so that when Mr. Bidwell writes of a new borer attacking the 

 peach trees in South Haven, Mr. Wm. Strong of the apples being severely 

 attacked by a caterpillar in Kalamazoo, Mr. Sleeper of a new weevil attacking 

 the plum at Galesburg, Mr. Drew of whole orchards succumbing to a new 

 measuring caterpillar in Oakland, the several cases may receive the most able 



