THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



27 



be shaken through tlie centnil hole into the hollow 

 space below, whence it would be very difficult or 

 almost impossible for them to make their way up 

 again. According to Mr. M. S. Hill of Ohio, the 

 farmers in that State got rid of the Blister-beetle 

 in their potato fields in 1866, by burning small 

 quantities of straw between the rows. (See Prac- 

 tical Entomologist, Vol. I, p. 107.) As the news- 

 papers often say, •' this requires confirmation," be- 

 fore we finally accept it as an available remedy. 



B. U. W. 



KLIPPAET'S WHEAT PLANT. 



This is a book of TOO pages, on a subject of great 

 practical importance, published in 1860, at Cincin- 

 nati, Ohio. Its author has, for many years, filled 

 the responsible position of Corresponding Secretary 

 of the Ohio State Board of Agriculture, is a mem- 

 ber of several Learned Societies in the West, and 

 is popularly believed, in the Valley of the Missis- 

 sippi, to be one of the most distinguished men of 

 science in that region. 



On the merits of the great bulk of the book, I 

 shall say nothing, because having read but a small 

 part of it, I know nothing whatever about the re- 

 mainder. But as to the Chapter on "Animal para- 

 sites affecting the wheat," whieli occupies 45 pages 

 printed in much smaller type than the rest of the 

 work, (pp. 592 — 6o8,) I am enabled to pronounce 

 a very decided opinion, beeau.se 1 have read that 

 much of the book very carefully. If, after hearing 

 the evidence, the reader, iu common with myself, 

 should be inclined to pronounce an unfavorable ver- 

 dict upon the merits of this ('hapter, Mr. Klippart 

 has no one to blame but himself I fully acquit him 

 of intentional misrepresentation. His sins are those 

 of careless hastiness and gross ignorance, not of wil- 

 ful misstatement or intentional suppression of the 

 truth. But surely this is not a sufficient excuse for 

 a writer. If a thing is worth doing at all, it is 

 worth doing well. Before a man undertakes to 

 teach arithmetic, he should at least know the mul- 

 tiplication table. Before he professes to lecture on 

 geometry, he should find out the diifcrence between 

 a circle and a square. And in the same way, be- 

 fore a writer publishes a treatise on noxious insects, 

 he is bound in scientific honor to make himself ac- 

 quainted with at least the rudimentary elements of 

 the science of Entomology. 



If we accept Jlr. Kiippart at his own valuation, 

 he claims to be an entomologist of very distinguish- 

 ed attainments. One of the most difficult problems 

 in entomology is, to decide to what perfect insect a 

 particular larva belongs, when the perfect insect 

 has never yet been actually bred from that larva. 

 Yet on p. 593 he says of such a lai-va, with all the 

 self-sufficient authority of a master of the science, 

 "We consider it to be the offispring oi Agriole^ spu- 

 tator and A'jrintvf, Uni'alux." How the same larva 

 happens to be produced by two entirely distinct bee- 

 tles, he does not explain. Njt to weary the reader 

 with cases of this kind, in a note to page 6U3 he dis- 

 putes, on the most frivolous grounds, the opinion of 

 Dr. Fitch, in a matter wlisrc, as we might natural 



ly expect. Dr. Fitch is in the right, and the Ohio 

 gentleman is in the wrong. Indeed, I hav.e no hesi- 

 tation in saying, that the little finger of Dr. Fitch 

 would cut up into a hundred such so-called ento- 

 mologists as this Mr. Klippart, and as in the mira- 

 cle of the loaves and fishes, leave full as much stufiF 

 behind, to be gathered up in baskets at the end of 

 the operation, as was found to be present at the 

 outset. 



"But," it will be said, "these are mere unmean- 

 ing generalities." Very well, then. Let us, at the 

 risk of being tedious, look carefully into the hard 

 dry facts of the case. 



Mr. Klippart professes to give a history of the 

 various Noxious Insects that infest the Wheat- 

 plant in this country, and of the difl'erent parasitic 

 and cannibal insects that prey upon them. I have 

 carefully catalogued the species named by him as 

 coming under these categories, and they are 54 in 

 number; and of most of these he gives brief des- 

 criptions and figures. Will it be believed now, that, 

 out of this total of 54 professedly American insects, 

 there arc only 12 that are really found in America, 

 the remaining 42 being exclusively European ? Yet 

 such is the fact. Nay, further. Out of the 12 in- 

 sects really found in America, there are only 3 that 

 are exclusively American, the other 9 species being 

 imported insects, which have been introduced into 

 America from Europe or the reverse, and the his- 

 tory of which he has copied almost verbatim from 

 European Authors. 



When I was a school-boy, my school-master, be- 

 ing a very severe disciplinarian, was in the habit of 

 frequently inflicting punishment upon a very large 

 number of us at once. Out of a class of perhaps 

 25 boys he would often punish, at one fell swoop, 

 22 or 23. To save time and trouble, therefore, he 

 used to enumerate only those few that escaped cas- 

 tigation, and say nothing at all of tho.'^e whom he 

 intended to receive it. For example, he would say^ 

 "All the boys except Brown and Smith will learn 

 by heart the first Chapter of Matthew, and recite it 

 without missing a word tomorrow morning." Upon 

 the same principle, and in order to save printing a 

 tedious list of names which would soon exhaust the 

 reader's patience, instead of cataloguing the 42 Eu- 

 ropean insects that Mr. Klipjiart wrongly assumes to 

 be found in the United States, I shall content my- 

 self with enumerating only the 12 which he cor- 

 rectly states to be found there ; and thus the 12 in- 

 nocent ones being named, it will be easy to see who 

 are the 42 guilty culprits. The 12 veritable U. S. 

 species are the following: — 1st., Aphis f/raiiaria, 

 the Grain Flantlouse, usually now cMed Aphis ao- 

 enx. 2nd., Cecidomijia (flip/osis) trititi, the Wheat 

 midge. 3rd., Cecidomijia di-structur, the Hessian 

 Fly. 4th., Ccdandra (sitophdus) orijr.ec, the llice 

 Weevil. 6th., Trofjosita mnurilanica, the Cadelle, 

 common in granaries in Europe, and quoted in the 

 Melsheimer Catalogue as occurring in this country 

 also. 7th. Tcnelirio molitor, the European Meal- 

 worm beetle. 8th. T<:n<'.hrio obscunis, the N. A. 

 Meal-worm beetle, introduced into England from 

 the United States. 9th. Tiiua (jraiu l/a,lhii Giviin- 



