THE AGE OF INSECTS. 

 By Z. p. Metcalf 



Geologists are in the habit of speaking of this as the "age of man" 

 or the Psycozoic era. From this stated opinion I wish to dissent, for 

 this evening at least, and call your attention to the fact that while we 

 as humans may speak of this egotistically as the "age of man" it is 

 not the age of man but the age of insects in which we are living. Man 

 may try to dominate this age but on every hand he finds his efforts 

 thwarted and at every point he must give way to numerous hordes of 

 insects whose chief aim seems to be to overthrow the kingdom of man 

 on this world. The late unpleasantness in Europe is remembered 

 by our soldiers, not so much as a war on the Boche, as a war on in- 

 numerable insect pests denominated cooties. And even those of us 

 who had no chance at first-hand knowledge can sympathize with 

 the young Canadian who, when he was decorated with some medal or 

 other for outstripping his fellows in a charge, remarked that his in- 

 terest in the matter was not in the charge but in the hope that he could 

 run fast enough and far enough to escape the cooties. 



As in war so in peace, on every hand we find our lives circum- 

 scribed and our efforts limited because of the presence of numerous 

 insect pests. Our crops, our domesticated animals are increasingly 

 subjected to their attacks. Our forests are devastated by them. Our 

 houses and our stores are destroyed by them. Our books and our 

 paintings are marred by them. Whole regions of the world are prac- 

 tically unfit for human habitation because of the diseases they carry, 

 and human want and human suffering abound in all quarters because 

 of these troublesome httle pests. In fact, they have so adapted them- 

 selves that it is impossible to think of any relation of human life and 

 human culture that is not colored in some way by insects, yea even 

 as pointed out below our very existence is dependent upon them. 



It would seem logical, therefore, that anything that touches us so 

 vitally ought to be pretty well understood. Yet, I believe I am safe 

 in saying that there is no group of animals so little known, to zoolo- 

 gists even, as insects. This in spite of the fact that more of our zoolo- 

 gical literature, each year, is devoted to insects than all other animals 

 combined. Whole regions of the insect kingdom are still unsurveyed 

 and, while we know a little about the external anatomy of a few forms, 

 our knowledge of the internal anatomy is still largely based on the 



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