PACKARD] RELATIONS OF INSECTS TO MAN". 67 



the arm}' worm ? In the New England states is not the 

 face of nature almost transformed by the ravages of the 

 canker worm? How life to many would be glorified, and 

 this world seem a brighter one, if the flea, the louse and the 

 bed-bug were removed from its surface ! 



How much difference would it make to the world of insects 

 were man to be l)lotted out of existence? We imagine the 

 insects would look with as much indifference upon his re- 

 moval as we in turn regard the demise of a mosquito. Have 

 not, through the ages past, from the time when the first 

 grasshopper chirped upon a tree fern's leaf in the Devonian 

 forests of New Brunswick, millions of species of insects had 

 their day and died, with no human being to witness them ? 

 Imagine the eons and eons of measured eternity through 

 Avhich by day and night the busy hum of insect life has risen 

 and fallen with no human ear to listen. But on the other 

 hand blot out those busy servants of ours, the bees ; the mj'ri- 

 ads of insects that aid in fertilizing our vegetables and fruit 

 trees ; the silkworm, whose products form so large an item 

 in the commercial greatness of the East and of Southern 

 Europe ; the lac and dye insects ; those that produce galls 

 for making ink ; the myriads of grubs and flies that act as 

 scavengers, and purify the air, saving us from pestilence ; all 

 working so quietly and eff"ectively that few appreciate how 

 much we owe to them — blot out all of these and the world 

 would be a poor home for its owner, man. He would be 

 forced then, if never before, to appreciate the place of man 

 in creation, and would be taught that as an animal his life 

 touches at many points the lives and interests of the huml)le 

 creatures about him. 



We naturall}' divide insects into friends and foes, but 

 our senses are still quite uninstructed in distinguishing 

 them, and few but the trained entomologist can go into 

 the field or garden and mark this insect as a true friend, 

 and that, so much like the other that ordinary e3'es cannot 



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