96 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 



Within the year the Royal Agricultural Society has made the office of consulting 

 entomologist, or rather zoologist — for they have broadened the term — a salaried one, and 

 Mr. Cecil Warburton, an able student of zoology, although not known as an entomolo- 

 gist, has been appointed to the position. Mr. Warburton has published one report, 

 which is mainly compiled and devoted to extracts from the correspondence of the society, 

 but it is too early as yet to judge of his capabilities from our standpoint. 



Miss Ormerod's legitimate predecessor may be said to have been John Curtis, who, 

 from the beginning of Dr. Lindley's Gardener s Chronicle contiibuted an important series 

 of essays upon injurious insects to its columns, under the nom de }}lume " Ruricola " 

 Mr. Ourtis's connection with this famous agricultural journal was of great advantage to 

 him, as it enabled him to secure information and specimens from all parts of the king- 

 dom. He had also accumulated a large amount of information during the twenty years 

 he was engaged in writing his great work upon British entomology. When the Royal 

 Agricultural Society of England was founded, in 1840, the council of the Society invited 

 Mr. Curtis to ])repare a series of reports upon the insects affecting various crops culti- 

 vated in Great Britain and Ireland, and in the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society 

 for the years 1841 to 1857, he published a series of sixteen such reports The matter 

 of these reports, and also of his previously published Gardener's Chronicle articles, was 

 drawn upon largely for, and in fact forms the major portion of, his standard work upon 

 Farm Insects, published by Blackie & Sons, London, Glasgow and Edinburgh, in 1860. 

 Whether Curtis was remunerated for his work for the Royal Agricultural Society or not 

 I am unable at this time to state, although he probably received some compensation. I 

 learn, through the kindness of Mi&s Ormerod, that, chiefly on account of the value of his 

 writings upon economic entomology, Mr. Curtis was awarded a pension from the civil 

 list, which was augmented about three years before his death, on account of the sad loss 

 of sight which he experienced. 



In 1877 a strong effort was made to secure the appointment of a Government ento- 

 mologist. A conference was held at the Society of Arts, which was largely attended and 

 was presided over by the Duke of Buccleugh, K.G. The most important paper read was 

 by Mr. Andrew Murray, and after a long discussion the conference resolved : 



That much ot the loss occasioned by insects is preventable and ought to be prevented ; that it properly 

 belongs to government to provide the necessary means for protecting cultivators from this loss, as it is 

 only by simultaneous action over considerable districts that it can be effectually done, and government 

 alone possesses or can obtain the requisite means of indorsing such action ; that the president and lords of 

 the Council and the Agricultural Societies of the United Kingdom be infoimed of the opinion of this 

 conference and urged to take the subject at once into their consideration, with a view to providing a 

 remedy. 



While we have no doubt that this conference was of sufficient importance and 

 attracted enough attention to induce the president, lords, etc., to take the subject into 

 consideration, no further action resulted. 



Ireland. 



Mr. George H. Carpenter was appointed in 1890 cpnsulting entomologist to the 

 Royal Dublin Society, and has submitted four reports, entitled, Report on Economic 

 Entomology for the year 1890, and the same for 1891, 1892 and 1893. Reprints of 

 these reports from the Reports of the Council of the Royal Dublin Society have been 

 distributed Mr. Carpenter is assistant naturalist in the Science and Art Museum in 

 Dublin, and I am not informed as to whether he receives special compensation for his 

 work as consulting entomologist. 



India. 



Among the English colonies the government of India stands out very prominently 

 in the support which it has given to economic entomology. A most interesting account 

 of the beginning and growth of this work has been transmitted to me by Mr. E. 0. 

 Cotes, from which I take, for the purposes of this pajier, the following facts : 



The present arrangement was the outgrowth of two reports, one on the wheat and 

 rice weevil and the other on insecticides, which were drawn up unofficially in the early 



