APPENDIX. XV 



is worth trying. If we cannot exterminate it, the other excellent 

 remedies can be used for holding it in check. 



Professor Shaler. Had we not better wait until we can strike 

 a hard blow, and do the best we can this year with prevention ? 



Professor Rilet. I am strongly of opinion that you had better 

 not wait. Some contingencies may arise to give it a sudden 

 impetus. I would adopt the auxiliary methods of introducing 

 parasites, etc., and I would also have a special committee author- 

 ized to inspect all nursery stock that goes out from the infested 

 region, and not allow it to go until passed upon by competent 

 men. 



Professor Ferxald thought the Federal government might take 

 charge of the work. Professor Riley stated that he would be glad 

 to assist in any way possible, but that since the establishment of 

 State experiment stations the Federal government felt it had no 

 further function in the States, so far as local insects are concerned. 

 Professor Shaler thought the State of Massachusetts should make 

 the fight itself, and only ask for Federal aid in case it could not 

 exterminate the pest. Twenty-four thousand dollars were on hand, 

 and he thought that twenty-five thousand dollars or fifty thousand 

 dollars more could be counted on from the Legislature. 



Mr. ScuDDER. I don't understand the force of the arguments 

 used by my neighbors on either side [Professors Riley and Fernald] 

 of delaying the work by not taking the eggs at present. Why do 

 they want all the caterpillars out that they can get, in order to ex- 

 terminate them? 



Professor Shaler. It is a question of seeing them, I believe. 



Mr. Scudder. I understand. But, if you destroy so many 

 eggs that say only one tree out of five is attacked, you have to 

 deal with only one-fifth as many trees in spraying. 



Professor Riley. I want to tell Mr. Scudder just why I rather 

 urge the policy I have advised. First of all, it is from the politi- 

 cal side. If you ask for an appropriation to stamp it out, you 

 must do your best to stamp it out. As Professor Fernald has 

 suggested, it is simply a question of means, and I would not think 

 of asking for less than one hundred thousand dollars, and I would 

 concentrate that where it would do the most good. Killing the 

 eggs is frittering the money away at a time when it is not of so 

 much value as if concentrated. Secondly, I have little faith in the 

 destruction of eggs in this case, where they are laid on so many 

 different objects. I remember distinctly a little cedar tree not 

 more than six feet high in ray own grounds that was attacked by 

 the bagworm. I thought I would see whether I could not clear 

 them off. I worked for two consecutive months picking off from 



