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BIOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF CIVILIZATION ON 

 THE INSECT FAUNA OF OHIO. 



BY F. M. WEBSTER. 



The true" biological effects of the development of a 

 country, especially if devoted to agriculture, even though 

 occurring so recently as in Ohio, can probably never be 

 determined. Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the 

 insect fauna, as, perhaps, no other thread in the great skein 

 of animal life so quickly feels the touch of civilization, or so 

 promptly responds to its influences. To secure the exact 

 data necessary to such a knowledge, requires that an ento- 

 mologist visit a country far in advance of his race and 

 study, assiduousl}- and with the utmost care, the forms that 

 there occur, unrestrained and uninfluenced, by the actions of 

 civilized man. Nol only this must be done, but the collec- 

 tor must survive to work over his material in the light of 

 modern science. This does not often occur, and the two 

 veteran entomologists and explorers, Mr. Henry W. Bates, 

 who buried himself for eleven years in the forests along the 

 River Amazon, and Mr. Alfred Russell Wallace, who first 

 accompanied him, but later went to the Malay Archipelago, 

 and among its tropical jungles isolated himself for upwards 

 of eight years, are perhaps the only instances worthy of 

 mention where this has occurred. Doubly valuable has the 

 work of these two men been to the entomologists of the 

 world, because, in studying their material, they have had 

 the benefit of each other's experiences in widely separated 

 parts of the globe, and also the council and advice of Charles 

 Darwin. We must, however, remember that the work is 

 but half completed, and it requires that a century hence, 



