ENTOMOLOGICAL SOOIETY OF ONTARIO. 97 



since 1874 made very detailed studies on the migration and breeding habits and means of 

 destruction of this locust (published in his Missouri State Report for 1876 and 1877). 

 Dr. Cyrus Thomas had also been attached to Hayden's Survey, and published a mono- 

 graph on the locust family, Acrididce. As the result of this combined work Congress 

 created the United States Entomological Commission, attaching to it Dr. Hayden's Sur- 

 vey, and the Secretary of the Interior appointed Charles V. Riley, A. S. Packard and 

 Gyrus Thomas members of the Commission. Dr. Riley was appointed chief, and it 

 was mainly owing to his executive ability, business sagacity, experience in official life, 

 together with his scientific knowledge and practical inventive turn of mind in devising 

 remedies, or selecting those invented by others, that the work of the Commission was so 

 popular and successful during the five years ot its existence. Meanwhile in 1878 while 

 the report of the Commission was being printed, Riley accepted the position of Entomolo- 

 gist to the U. S. Department of Agriculture, and during the season of 1879 and 1880 he 

 investigated the cotton insects, but owing to the lack of harmony in the Department, he 

 resigned. Prof. J. H. Comstock being appointed, and ably filling the position. Congress 

 meanwhile transferred the cotton-worm investigation to the Entomological Commission. 

 Riley was reappointed to the position of U. S. Entomologist in June, 1881. His suc- 

 cessor, Mr. L. O. Howard, has stated how efficient, broad and thorough was his admin- 

 istration of this office : " The present efficient organization of the Division of Entomology 

 was his own original conception, and he is responsible for its plan down to the smallest 

 detail. It is unquestionably the foremost organization of its kind at present in existence." 

 Again he writes : " Professor Riley's work in the organization of the Division of Ento- 

 mology has unquestionably advanced the entire Department of which it is a part, for it 

 is generally conceded that this division has led in most matters where efficiency, discipline 

 and system were needed. Its plan and discipline have been cited by one of the heads of 

 the Department as worthy of imitation by all, and your own honored Westwood, in 

 expressing, in 1883, his admiration of Riley s work, said : ' I am sure it must have had a 

 great share in inducing the activity in entomological work in America, which is putting 

 to the blush the entomologists of Europe.' " 



Indeed, so efficient, methodical and painstaking was Riley in whatever he undertook 

 to do that had he been promoted to the position of Commissioner of Agriculture he would 

 have been head and shoulders above any incumbent of that office, and, it is safe to say, 

 would have administered its affairs with practical results far more valuable than those 

 attained by any other Commissioner, as such an office should have been entrusted to a 

 person who had had a scientific education, and not given as a reward for political service. 

 As it is, he was the leadex-, says Mr. Howard, in many important innovations in the work 

 of the department. His division published the first bulletin, and in Insect Life began 

 the system of periodical bulletins, which has since been adopted for the other divisions of 

 the Agricultural Department. He also took a large share in founding the Division of 

 Economic Ornithology, Silk Culture and Vegetable pathology, the first two being placed 

 for some time under his charge. In an address, says Howard, before the National A-^ri- 

 cultural Congress, delivered in 1879, in which he outlined the ideal Department of Agri- 

 culture, Professor Riley foreshadowed many important reforms which have since become 

 accomplished facts, and suggested the important legislation, since brought about, of the 

 establishment of State Experiment Stations under the general government. 



His practical, inventive genius was exhibited in his various means of exterminating 

 locusts, in the use of kerosene oil emulsified with milk or soap, and in his invention and 

 perfection — in which he was essentially aided by the late Dr. W. S. Barnard, who had 

 special charge of the subject of mechanical appliances and remedies while connected with 

 the Entomological Commission ^nd the Agricultural Department, and whose "assiscance 

 was fertile from the first," as stated by Riley in his report — of the " cyclone" or " eddy- 

 chamber" or Riley system of nozzles, which, in one form or another, are now in general 

 use in the spraying of insecticide or fungicide liquids. 



Although the idea of introducing foreign insect parasites or carnivorous enemies of 

 our imported pests had been suggested by others, Riley, with the resources of his division 



7 EN. 



