332 APPENDICES 



APPENDIX E (p. 223). 



Professor Charles Valentine Riley was killed by a fall from 

 his bicycle in the streets of Washington. He was riding, as 

 usual, to his office in the morning, accompanied by his young 

 son. It was down-hill, and he was evidently going rather fast, 

 when his wheel struck a stone carelessly left in the roadway 

 after repairs. He was thrown violently, and died from the 

 effects of the fall a few hours afterwards. 1 



' Biologist, artist, editor, and public official, the story of his 

 struggles and successes, tinged as it is with romance, is one full 

 of interest. Beginning life in America as a poor lad on an 

 Illinois farm, he rose by his own exertions to distinction. His 

 nature was a many-sided one, and his success in life was due to 

 sheer will-power, unusual executive force, critical judgment, 

 untiring industry, skill with pencil and pen, and a laudable 

 ambition, united with an intense love of nature and of science 

 for its own sake. This rare combination of varied qualities, of 

 which he made the most, rendered him during the thirty years 

 of his active life widely known as a public official, as a scientific 

 investigator, while of economic entomologists he was facile 

 princeps. 



' He was born at Chelsea, London, September 18, 1843. His 

 boyhood was spent at Walton-on-Thames, where he made the 

 acquaintance of the late W. C. Hewitson, author of many works 

 on butterflies, which undoubtedly developed his love for insects. 

 At the age of eleven he went to school for three years at Dieppe, 

 afterwards studying at Bonn-on-the- Rhine. At both schools he 

 carried off the first prizes for drawing, making finished sketches 

 of butterflies, thus showing his early bent for natural history. 

 It is said that a restless disposition led him to abandon the old 

 country, and at the age of seventeen he had emigrated to Illinois, 

 and settled on a farm about fifty miles from Chicago. When 

 about twenty-one he removed to Chicago, where he became a 

 reporter and editor of the entomological department of the 

 " Prairie Farmer." 



' Near the close of the war, in 1864, he enlisted as a private in 

 the 1 34th Illinois regiment, serving for six months, when he 

 returned to his editorial office. 



' He also enjoyed for several years the close friendship of 

 B. D. Walsh, one of our most thorough and philosophic ento- 

 mologists, with whom he edited the " American Entomologist." 

 His industry and versatility, as well as his zeal as an entomolo- 



1 The substance of the foregoing statement was supplied by Dr. Bethune. 

 The following (condensed) obituary notice by Professor A. S. Packard, of 

 Brown University, and referred to by Miss Ormerod, appeared in " Science," 

 and subsequently in the " Canadian Entomologist." 



