ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 15 



that if the work of all the other societies was as well done as the work of thi? Society 

 our labors at Toronto would be very much relieved. When the report comes in it is 

 ready at once to go to the printer and we have no further work in connection with it, and 

 year after year when I read that report I have been astonished with the amount of work 

 that has been condensed and packed away. It is not a padded report, it is a report full 

 of intormation. In looking over the list of persons to whom it is sent I find it has gone 

 to almost every corner of the world. These men have not been content to hide their 

 light under a bushel, but their work has gone out into every province, and has gone out 

 into the whole world. Someone may say, " I do not see any good in finding out what is 

 the peculiarity of certain insects or finding out just how they live." I do not see any 

 good result coming trom the work of the bacteriologist who studies with the microscope 

 things small, so that if you were to take up a drop of milk on the point of your penknife 

 and were able to count its inhabitants you would find 1,000,000,000 of these living plants in 

 that drop of milk. The whole system of dairying has been revolutionized by the work of 

 that man who is sometimes called unpractical. 



Whenever I hear any of these objections I sometimes think of a saying of Franklin. 

 Franklin you remember in connection with his experiments in electricity sent a kibe into 

 the clouds. He told the people that there was electricity up there and they laughed at 

 him. He sent up his kite but the electricity did not come down. However, fortunate 

 for the occasion, we are told, that the kite went up into a black, dark cloud which he 

 positively felt was filled with electricity. Shortly afterwards the rain began to fall. It 

 came down wetting the kite and trickling down the string. Then the hand that held the 

 ■^et string began to feel the throbbing of the electricity \ he proved it to th«m and they 

 said. "What is the use of it?" And he said. " What is the use of a baby % It will grow 

 to be a man." So in regard to many of these inventions or discoveries or conclusions that 

 the entomologists, and chemists and botanists, and bacteriologists, and biologists and 

 other scientists may find with regard to agriculture. Their discoveries are in the con- 

 dition of Franklin's baby, and if we will only wait and have faith in the work we are en- 

 gaged in and give true encouragement and sympathy, some of us at least may live to 

 see these scientific babies grow up to be good, strong, stalwart men in connection with 

 the practice of agriculture in which we are so much interested. (Applause). 



At the conclusion of Prof. James's address, which was listened to with great attention 

 and heartily applauded, Dr. Bethune rose and said : 



Mr. Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen, — I propose that we offer our very hearty 

 thanks to Prof. James, for the able and interesting address which he has just given us. 

 Prof. James has come, I am sure, at a grest deal of inconvenience to himself on purpose 

 to be present with us here to-night, and to encourage us by the remarks which he has 

 made, and also to give us a great deal of very valuable information. While thanking 

 him for his address to-night I should also like to take the opportunity,as one of the original 

 members of this Society, to express the gratitude that our Society must necessarily feel 

 towards the Department of Agriculture for Ontario, of whicl* Prof. James is Deputy 

 Minister. He has remarked this evening that our Society has been in existence for 

 twenty-five years and the Mayor has also mentioned to-night, that our magazine. The, 

 Canadian Entomologist, is now the oldest magazine touching on the subject, upon the 

 whole continent of America. But I wish to let you knosv one reason why our Society 

 and our magazine have survived so many others that have have started in the United 

 States and Canada and that is, that we have been so greatly helped throughout nearly 

 the whole of our existence, by the Department of Agriculture for Ontario. (Applause.) 

 We began in a very small and humble way with a little magazine of eight pages that 

 was to be published whenever we bad enough material and enough money, and we had 

 fourteen members, all told, when we began. And we managed like many other societies 

 to struggle on, but unlike most societies of this kind, we have not died a natural death in 

 a few years. The Department of Agriculture came to our assistance, and gave us a small 

 grant at first, which was subsequently greatly increased, so thit while a number of years 



