328 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [December, 



is not infested, and then preserve either in glass jars or in tight tin boxes. 

 Almost anything else these insects will bore through. When glass or tin 

 are not available, or cannot be used for any reason, it has been found that 

 a liberal use of naphthaline will keep out the insects fairly well, and where 

 the material has become infested, naphthaline usually checks further in- 

 crease, though it does not kill the specimens themselves. Wherever the 

 material will not be injured thereby, exposure to the fumes of carbon 

 disulphide is the most satisfactory method of getting rid of the insects; 

 but a beetle that will attack the entomologist's cigars is mean enough for 

 anything, and must be closely watched. 



Fangi versus Insects.— In "Science" for October 20th, Mr. Gerald 

 McCarthy has a paper under the above title, in which there is really no- 

 thing new, nor anything newly stated. But it presents on one hand the 

 fact that we cannot hope to make any permanent impression upon inju- 

 rious insects by our present methods, unless they are much more gener- 

 ally adopted, and on the other hand suggests that we have in the cultiva- 

 tion of fungous and bacterial diseases the probable remedy of the future. 

 Now, it is undoubtedly true, as he suggests, that our application of insec- 

 ticides is not so efficient as it might be, but that is not due in all cases to 

 the practice itself; only to the fact that it is not universally and properly 

 applied. It is beyond reasonable doubt that if, for only three years in 

 succession, every farmer and other tiller of the soil within the boundaries 

 of the United States, would make intelligent and conscientious use of the 

 remedies that we have against the Codling moth, that within that time the 

 insects would be so reduced in number, that for a long time to come they 

 could not be ranked as injurious, and in some places might be even ex- 

 terminated. That farmers do not adopt these measures is no proof that 

 they are not practical, nor that they are not efficient. In fact, we can say 

 that they are not only practical, but that they are absolutely certain. Our 

 effort should be, therefore, to convince the farmer of the importance of 

 adopting these remedies, and we should try to educate him to the point 

 that he will himself see that it will pay him to use every possible method 

 to clear out these pests. By a system of legislation we may be able to 

 reach the ignorant or stubborn specimen and force him to look after his 

 own interests, so that we can look forward to a time in the future when 

 insect pests will cause little practical injury. Now this suggested remedy 

 for using fungous diseases to destroy insects has a very tempting sound, 

 and in some cases it would undoubtedly prove successful; but, really, 

 those cases are rare, and depend upon so many factors of which we prac- 

 tically know nothing; or which, when we do know them, are beyond our 

 control, that we could never tell beforehand what the result is going to 

 be. Practical experience has shown that diseases which attack one spe- 

 cies will, very frequently, pass by even a very closely allied one, and we 

 have seen, too, that for some years in succession diseases have carried off 

 insects of certain kinds by the wholesale, while for a long series of years 

 afterward they were practically exempt. Insect diseases, like a good 



