WHOLE VOL. APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY HOWARD I9I 



haps the cotton boll weevil would occur there. None was found. 

 Incidentally also, during this trip I made my first acquaintance with 

 one of the kissing-bugs (RasaJius biguttatus). 



In 1902 I made a second trip to Mexico, largely for the purpose of 

 trying to find whether the cotton boll weevil is parasitized to any 

 extent there. In the City of Mexico I had the pleasure for the first 

 time of meeting Prof. A. L. Herrera, who was then the leading eco- 

 nomic entomologist of that republic. I found him to be a man of wide 

 reading and excellently well informed concerning the insect prob- 

 lems of Mexico. I called with him on the Minister of Fomento 

 (Seiior Limantour, as I recollect) and talked at length on the general 

 problems of economic entomology. My Spanish was practically neg- 

 ligible, and the conversation was carried on in French. Herrera at 

 that time spoke no English and very little French. His wife and his 

 sister, however, spoke good French, and there was little difficulty in 

 our mutual understanding. 



With Herrera's help, I went south to Oaxaca, met Mr. Grandison, 

 a prominent cotton broker, and took a trip to the east to a cotton- 

 growing region, and not only failed to find the boll weevil but also 

 failed to find anybody who knew anything about it or had ever heard 

 of it. 



On my way back to the States from the City of Mexico, I stopped 

 at Guanajuato to pay my respects to the veteran entomologist, Alfredo 

 Duges. Doctor Duges had for many years been known as the most 

 prominent entomologist in Mexico. He was French by birth, and for 

 many years had held the position of French Consul. He taught sci- 

 entific subjects in one of the educational institutions, and had long 

 been an ardent collector and student in many branches of natural 

 history. He was the teacher, in fact, of Professor Herrera. I found 

 him in his own home, crowded by natural history specimens. Snakes 

 in alcohol, stufTed birds and mammals, boxes of insects, and plant 

 herbaria occupied most of the available space. He managed to find 

 a seat for me, and we chatted for a long time, particularly, as I recol- 

 lect it, on the subject of mosquitoes, and mosquito-borne diseases. 



My third and last trip to that country was made in 1904, the object 

 being again boll weevil parasites but more particularly the distribution 

 of the yellow fever mosquito at Mexican elevations above 3,000 feet. 

 Again the results were negative as to the boll weevil, but some very 

 interesting points were gathered concerning the mosquito. I went 

 slowly down from the City of Mexico to Vera Cruz. The yellow 

 fever mosquito of course was very abundant in Vera Cruz, also at 

 Cordoba, and less so at Orizaba. The people at the latter place told 



