314 JOURNAL OP ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol.2 



the cockroach and the mayfly heralded the oncoming myriads of their 

 congeners which yet endure and probably will endure as long as the 

 world sustains life. One of our entomologists in forecasting the like- 

 lihood of the long survival of the insect class breaks forth in the fol- 

 lowing poetic language: ''When the moon shall have faded from the 

 sky and the sun shall shine at noonday a dull cherry red, and the 

 seas shall be frozen over and the ice-cap shall have crept downward 

 to the equator from either pole, and no keel shall cut the waters, nor 

 wheels turn in mills, when all cities shall have long been dead and 

 crumbled into dust, and all life shall be on the very last verge of 

 extinction on this globe, then, on a bit of lichen, growing on the bald 

 rocks beside the eternal snows of Panama, shall be seated a tiny in- 

 sect, preening its antennae in the glow of the wornout sun, represent- 

 ing the sole survival of animal life on this, our earth, — a melancholy 

 'bug.'"- 



The long period through which the Class Insecta has existed has 

 caused it to develop an almost incredible number of species, some 

 among them adapted to every condition of climate and topography on 

 the globe. Excepting the microscopic forms of animals and plants, 

 the number of all other species of living things added together, mam- 

 mals, birds, fishes, reptiles, animals of whatsoever class, trees and 

 plants total together but a small fraction of the number of species 

 in the insect world. The number of species is variously estimated at 

 from 2,500,000 to 10,000,000, with the probabilities favoring the lat- 

 ter figure as the more nearly correct. Assuming the maximum figure 

 to be correct, in what a field does the entomologist find himself! 

 Suppose that he attempts to familiarize himself with each species so 

 that he will recognize it the next time he sees it. Since his task is 

 obviously great, we will start him at it at the age of five years and 

 allot him five minutes in which to study each species, giving one half 

 of the time to a male specimen and one half to a female. Lest he 

 should become lazy, we will provide him with electric lights and keep 

 him working day and night, and lest he should become fat, we will 

 forbid him to eat except as he is able to snatch mouthfuls from the 

 five-minute intervals during which he is expected to fix in his memory 

 the anatomical characters, color patterns, etc., which differentiate 

 each species from every kindred one. Working in this manner and 

 at this rate, the rains of nearly one hundred summers will have fal- 

 len on his roof before the last representative of the long procession 

 of insects has passed before him, and he is permitted to step outside 

 his door to renew his childhood and behold a real live grasshopper 



^'W. J. Holland, end of Moth Book. 



