ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 



Philadelphia, Pa., June, 191 8. 



Making the Editorial of Greater Use To Entomology. 



In a recent (December, 1917) number of the Sigma Xi 

 Quarterly, the hterary editor of The Independent has some 

 amusing remarks "From the other side of the Barricade," 

 the obstacle in question being that which separates editors 

 from non-editors. Many topics are touched upon but for our 

 present purpose we wish merely to quote the following : 



And there are others, graduate students, assistants, teachers, men 

 who stand at the very frontier of human knowledge, familiar with 

 sources, knowing real science from fake science, eager and able to 

 write, but when they come to me or I get after them they ask helpless- 

 ly: "What do you want me to write about?" 



What do they take an editor for anyway? If I knew what they 

 know I should not ask them to write. I should do it myself. Do they 

 think that our correspondent somewhere in France cables to us : "Come 

 over and tell me what there is here to write about"? Do they think 

 that our^ musical critic drops in to ask: "Have I heard any new com- 

 posers lately whom you think I ought to write about and, if so, what 

 should I say about them?" Did Columbus go to King Ferdinand and 

 inquire: "Has Your Majesty anything in the sea-faring line that 

 you would like to have me do?" 



To these extracts we should like to add the last sentence 

 from the First Report of Committee on Zoology of the Na- 

 tional Research Council : "The Committee .... invites from 

 every zoological investigator in the country ^ statement of the 

 things most urgently needed for the promotion of his own 

 research work." 



The needs and problems of The Independent are not those 

 of the News or of other entomological journals, at the pres- 

 ent time at least. Whatever opinions may be held as to the 

 value of the articles published in the periodicals of our sci- 

 ence, there is now no lack of material to occupy the available 

 monthly or quarterly space. These articles are almost wholly 

 technical, often narrowly so. But in the prosecution of such 

 special and limited researches, difficulties, errors and hind- 



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