WHOLE VOL. APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY — HOWARD 237 



ration of his book, and the book was very properly dedicated to the 

 Marechal. In acknowledging this dedication with very gracefully 

 expressed thanks, the Marechal added the following striking and 

 beautifully expressed paragraph: 



I have deplored for a long time the ignorance of people who occupy themselves 

 with horticulture concerning the insects that do so much harm to our gardens 

 and with regard to those insects which are our most useful helpers. We kill 

 them all without distinction, or we kill none at all. Precious friends or terrible 

 enemies, it is all the same ; and if there are any exceptions these are due rather 

 to beauty of form and to brilliancy of color than to useful qualities or hoped-for 

 help. It is time that this should stop. Our teachers in the primary schools, if 

 they could give their scholars some notions about the insects that render so much 

 labor useless and about the creatures which God has created to be our collab- 

 orators, would merit our gratitude. Linnaeus, I believe, once said that 

 the object of agriculture and horticulture is to make the lives of men more easy 

 and more agreeable. How can we reach this end if we abandon the best part 

 of the products of the soil without struggle and without effort to all these 

 creatures which we know only through their damage? 



Prior to the publication of Doctor Boisduval's important book, a 

 plan had been elaborated by Emile Blanchard for the preparation and 

 publication of a large work on agricultural zoology. This was car- 

 ried into effect only so far as the publication of a certain portion, 

 namely the insects injurious to ornamental plants. This was put out 

 in beautiful form, in cjuarto, and was illustrated by a series of exqui- 

 site colored plates showing the flowering plants with the insects. The 

 bound copy of this work in the possession of the United States 

 Department of Agriculture contains 192 pages of text and 19 plates. 

 The writer is in doubt as to the date of publication of this volume. It 

 is not indicated in the work itself. The British Musetim Catalogue 

 places it at 1854. Hagen's Bibliotheca, in the appendix, places it at 

 1859, but refers only to Part i with eight colored plates. Boisduval. 

 in the introduction to the work just cited, states that Blanchard com- 

 menced the publication of the work in 1857. He writes concernmg 

 it (translated), " In 1857 M- E. Blanchard commenced the publica- 

 tion of his Agricultural Zoology, a work whose beautiful plates make 

 us regret that other labors prevented the author from following up 

 this enterprise." It was an ambitiously planned work, and had its 

 author been able to follow it through it would doubtless have been a 

 great stimulus to agricultural entomology. 



In its introduction occurs a paragraph which indicates the condi- 

 tion of knowledge at the time of writing. It is (translated) : " Each 

 year from every part of the civilized world one hears complaints of 

 the ravages of insects upon vegetation, of damage to the plants that 



