178 Forty-seventh Report on the State Museum 



the reports of the several members of the State Museum Scientific 

 Staff, covering the entire year's operations, could be printed dur 

 ing the spring following thereafter, it would, I am confident, leave 

 nothing further in time of publication to be desired. The present 

 system has been found to be unsatisfactory and vexatious, as 

 may appear from the delay attending the printing of the State 

 Museum Keports for the years 1891 and 1892 — the reports of 

 the Geologist, Botanist, and Entomologist contained therein 

 being still in MS. The reports for l'-91 narrowly escaped 

 destruction in the burning of the State Printing House, in Sep- 

 tember, 1892. 



Increasing Interest in the "Work of the Department. 



The work of my Department continues to increase in propor- 

 tion to the greater interest that is being taken in it, as the result 

 of annually increasing insect ravages, the necessity of resisting 

 them if serious losses shall not be sustained, and a conviction 

 that experience has given our agriculturists that it is within their 

 power to lessen, these losses very materially through a faithful 

 use of the means that the economic Entomologist has pointed out. 



Applications for aid in meeting insect attacks have been 

 numerous, and in nearly every instance it has been possible to 

 return information that could not fail of being of service to the 

 inquirer. The correspondence of the office is steadily growing. 

 Much of the information sent from it has been in communica- 

 tions made to leading agricultural papers, and to the local press 

 when some new form of attack is apparently confined to a lim- 

 ited portion of the State. In replies to inquiries, which are often 

 limited to the name of the depredator and remedies or protec- 

 tion, it has been the aim to add such details of life history and 

 habits, especially if not previously published, as may tend to 

 give them permanent value and serve as additions to the steadily 

 increasing stock of economic entomological literature. 



Publications of the Entomologist. 



Including a few papers printed in scientific journals, more than 

 fifty publications have been made by the Entomologist during 

 January- August of the present year. The usual list, giving 

 titles, place of publication and summaries of contents, will be 

 communicated for the next report. 



