318 JOURNAL OP ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 2 



wheat growers, or, if during the past fifty years any person could 

 have appropriated to himself the wealth which this insect has de- 

 stroyed he would be worth $350,000,000 with accrued compound in- 

 terest and earnings to be added thereto, and could invite Mr. Rocke- 

 feller to take second place in the magnate row. The Mexican cotton 

 boll weevil crossed the Rio Grande River into Texas in the early '90s 

 and, advancing over the cotton-growing territory at an average rate 

 of seventy-five to one hundred miles annually, has now reached Arkan- 

 sas and the Indian territory on the north and the valley of the 

 Mississippi on the east. ''The damage it has done and the fears it 

 has aroused in other cotton-growing countries have threatened a dis- 

 turbance in the balance of trade for the entire world."* The damage 

 inflicted by this insect during the seasons of its greatest abundance is 

 estimated to have been from $15,000,000 to $30,000,000. In 1894 it 

 damaged the crop in Texas alone to the extent of $8,000,000. The 

 gypsy moth was introduced into America by accident in 1868 or 1869. 

 A French naturalist, artist and astronomer, living at that time near 

 Glenwood, IMedford, Mass., was experimenting in raising silk with our 

 native silkworms, and also imported European species for the same 

 purpose. Among his shipments were the eggs of the gypsy moth and 

 a gust of wind is said to have carried some of them through an open 

 window. Mr. Trouvelot was greatly disturbed by the accident, and 

 failing after diligent search to find the eggs, gave public notice of the 

 calamity, much to the amusement of his neighbors, who were unable 

 to understand his anxiety. During the first ten years after its escape 

 no one, except Mr. Trouvelot, is known to have observed it. Twenty 

 years after its escape, in 1889, the first extensive outbreak occurred. 

 Since its first outbreak it has spread over extensive districts in Mas- 

 sachusetts, and has also appeared in the neighboring states of Rhode 

 Island and New Hampshire. 



A resident of the infested district in Massachusetts gives the follow- 

 ing description of the ravages of the g^'psy moth: "The caterpillars 

 were so thick in the trees that you could hear them eating. They would 

 get on the fences until they made them fairly black. They would crawl 

 upon and into the houses. They would get inside somehow, and it Avas 

 a common thing to see them crawling upon a table, and we have even 

 found them on the beds. They would get under steps, stones and into 

 old stovepipes, old cans, boxes, in short any place which afi^orded shel- 

 ter. They crawled into the cellar windows. They were so thick on 

 the street trees that people would walk out in the middle of the street, 

 where there were fewer dropping down. It is no exaggeration to say 



^Dr. L. O. Howard in Science. 



