254 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL.84 



adaptable linguistically, but on my last two interviews with him he 

 threw aside his false pride and spoke very acceptable French with 

 me. 



The white scale {Diaspis pentagona) made its destructive appear- 

 ance upon mulberries in Italy about 1888, and it was described by 

 Targioni-Tozzetti as " the new Coccid of the mulberry " {la nuova 

 Cocciniglia del Gelso). It multiplied and spread slowly, but eventu- 

 ally became so serious an enemy to the mulberry, and therefore to the 

 great silk industry of Italy, that it occupied much of the attention of 

 the Italian economic entomologists. At first, sprays of different kinds 

 were used. On one of my early visits to Florence, Berlese asked me 

 whether the scale occurred in the United States. I replied yes, that 

 it occurred upon peach trees in Georgia and that I had seen it upon 

 peach and cherry trees in the District of Columbia, but that I thought 

 it might be a different species after all, since in one instance, just 

 behind the insectary on the Department of Agriculture grounds, the 

 limbs of an infested peach tree interlocked with the limbs of a mul- 

 berry tree and the scale had not gone to the mulberry. I told him, 

 however, that the scale was not apparently a dangerous one with us, 

 and he asked me whether it was parasitized. As a matter of fact, we 

 had not up to that time reared any parasites from it, but I cabled im- 

 mediately to Mr. Marlatt to secure twigs affected by the Diaspis and 

 to forward them to Berlese. This was done. Marlatt found a lilac 

 bush in the garden of a well known lady who lived on H Street, North- 

 west, and secured her permission to cut some of the twigs for sending 

 to Berlese. Eventually they arrived in Florence, and Berlese reared 

 from them a minute Aphelinine which he sent to me in Washington 

 for naming. I found it to be a new species of Prospaltella, and 

 named it after him, P. bcrlesci, sending him the description w^hich 

 was published in the Rivista of his Station. 



As it happens, this introduction was one of the striking successes 

 in the international exchange of parasites. Under the care of Ber- 

 lese and his assistants, it multiplied and was colonized in different 

 mulberry groves in north Italy, and, according to reports, was emi- 

 nently successful in keeping the destructive Diaspis in check. 



Soon after this came what seemed to me the first break in the 

 friendship between Berlese and Silvestri. Silvestri, possibly incited 

 by the success of the Prospaltella introduction, began immediately to 

 correspond with entomologists in dift'erent parts of the world and to 

 introduce into southern Italy all of the natural enemies of the Diaspis 

 that he could get, not only internal parasites but predators. Berlese 

 objected to this, stating that, having established a good parasite which 



