ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 83 



This brief historical paragraph is introduced for the purpose of showing the interest- 

 ing paradox that this Association was originally made olhcial by non-officials, that it was 

 subsequently made non-official by officials, and that since it was made non-official it has 

 become more official than before. 



It is in part for this reason that I have chosen to bring together for presentation at 

 this meeting some account of the rise and present condition of official economic ento- 

 mology, but more largely for the other reasons that few of us probably have been able to 

 take a comprehensive view of the status of our application of entomology the world over, 

 and that a review of what has been done can not but justify our existence as a class and 

 as an association and afiard the strongest of arguments for the increase of our numbers 

 and for increase of means and facilities. 



The ravages ot insects on cultivated plants were doubtless coetaneous with the begin- 

 ning of the cultivation of plants. Thus a necessity for ecouomic entomologists existed 

 at a very early time. The condition of the ancient husbandman with reference to injuri- 

 ous insects is voiced by the prophet Joel, when he says : 



That which the palmer-worm hath left, hath the locust eaten ; and that which the locust hath left hath 

 the canker-worm eaten; and that which the canker-worm hath left hath t,he caterpillar eaten. * * * 

 He hath laid my vine w iste :ind barked my fig tree ; he hath made it clean bare and cast it away ; the 

 branches thereof are made white * * * -phe field is wasteil, the land mourneth. * * * Be 

 ye ashamed, O, ye husbandmen ; howl, O, ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley, because the 

 harvest of the field is perished. 



In 1881 Dr. Hagen published in the columns of the Neio Yorkf.r Belletristiches Jour- 

 nal (August 16) an interesting article entitled " Heuschrecken Kommissionen im Mittel- 

 alter and heute," in which he showed that grasshopper invasions have taken place since 

 time immemorial, and that man's efforts to combat them have always ended in his dis- 

 comfiture. It is not surprising, therefore, says Dr. Hagen, that the helpless multitude 

 called on the intervention of tue law and of Ood to delivt-r them from such pests ; and 

 the legislators on one side and the priests on the other were forced to carry out the will 

 of the people. But since written laws and legislative decrees against elemental plagues 

 would have been ridiculous without a surrounding of imposing, legally regulatei forms, 

 the development of these formalities gradual y reached a high degree of perfection. 

 Legislation for defense against injurious animals reached its highest development in the 

 Middle Ages Legal procedures against ail sorts of noxious animals were frt^qaent, and 

 the famous Burgundian legal light, Bartholorateus Chassanteus, wrote a book setting forth 

 the rules according to which a suit against grasshoppers should be entered. After a court 

 had been called together by written request, a judge was appointed and two lawyers were 

 elected, one to plead the cause of the people and one the cause of the accused grasshoppers. 

 The former commenced by formulating the charge, and concluded by requesting thit, the 

 grasshoppers be burned. The defendant's lawyer replied that such a request was illegal 

 before the grasshoppers had been requested in due form to leave the country. Wh' n, 

 however, they had not lett the country after a stated term, they could be excommunicated. 

 Many years afterward, another jurist, Hiob Ludolph, wrote a pamphlet antagonizing 

 Chassameus's work, setting forth the lamentable legal ignorance displayed by the latter. 

 The accused grasshoppers, said Ludolph, must be summoned four times before the court, 

 and if they do not appear, then they should be dragged b}^ force before the court. Then 

 only can the suit proceed. Other interested parties, however, shall be heard, namely, the 

 birds that feed on the grasshoppers. Further, it would be a great injustice to banish the 

 grasshuppers into adjacent territories Finally, ttie code proposed by Chassanaeus can 

 never be brought into accordance with the laws and rules of the Church, because there is 

 absolutely nothing in those laws about suits against grasshoppers. 



Several suits against injurious insects were brought before the courts, and the rulings 

 have bi en preserved. In one case (1479) a suit was brought against injurious worms, 

 apparently cut-worms, in the canton of Berne, Switzerland. The worms, although ably 

 deft nded, lost the suit, and were excommunicated by the archbishop and baui^shed. 

 Regarding the eftt-ct of this awful punishment, the chronicler who relates the story adds : 

 "No effect whatever resulted, evidently on account of the great depravity of the people." 



