THE VALUE OF BIRDS TO MAN. 



By James Buckland, 

 London, England. 



I saw with open eyes I saw in vision 



Singing birds sweet The tcorm in the wheat, 



Sold in the shops And in the shops nothing 



For people to eat. For people to eat; 



Sold in the shops of Nothing for sale in 



Stupidity Street. Stupidity Street. 



— Ralf Hodgson. 



NUMBER, FECUNDITY, AND VORACITY OF INSECTS. 



Man imagines himself to be the dominant power on the earth. He 

 is nothing of the sort. The true lords of the universe are the insects. 

 While it is true that man has invented and perfected so many de- 

 structive agencies that he has attained to a predominance over the 

 most fierce and powerful mammals and the most deadly reptiles, it 

 is also true that in face of an attack of insects he and all his works 

 are set at naught. 



"A little one shall become a thousand and a small one a strong 

 nation." Few people know how enormous is the number of insect 

 species or how amazing is their power of multiplication. The num- 

 ber of insect species is greateir by far than that of the species of all other 

 living creatures combined. Over 300,000 have been described, and 

 it is considered not improbable that twice that number remain to be 

 described. Practically all living animals, as well as most plants, 

 furnish food for these incomputable hordes. More than this, Kirby, 

 in the " Introduction to Entomology," devotes no less than five entire 

 epistles to the injuries we sustain from insects, while two only are 

 sufficient to describe the benefits they yield. 



The fecundity of certain insect forms is astounding, the numbers 

 bred reaching such prodigious proportions as to be almost beyond 

 belief. Riley once computed that the hop aphis, developing 13 gen- 

 erations in a single year^ would, if unchecked to the end of the 

 twelfth generation, have multiplied to the inconceivable number of 

 ten sextillions of individuals. Noting the preceding, Forbush says 

 if this brood were marshaled in line, 10 to the inch, it would extend 

 to a point so sunk in the profundity of space that light from the 

 head of the procession traveling at the rate of 184,000 miles per sec- 

 ond would require 2,500 years in which to reach the earth. 



439 



