748 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 49. 



ject of mechanical appliances and remedies 

 while connected with the Entomological 

 Commission and the Agricultural Depart- 

 ment, and whose ' assistance was fertile 

 from the first,' as stated by Eiley in his re- 

 port — of the ' cyclone ' or ' eddy-chamber ' 

 or Kiley system of nozzles, which, in one 

 form or another, are now in general use in 

 the spraying of insecticide or fungicide 

 liquids. 



Although the idea of introducing foreign 

 insect parasites or carnivorous enemies of 

 our imported pests had been suggested by 

 others, Eiley, with the resources of his 

 division at hand, accomplished more than 

 any one else in making it a success. We 

 will let Mr. Howard tell the story of his 

 success, with the efficient aid of Mr. Albert 

 Koebele, in introducing the Australian lady- 

 bird to fight the fluted scale: 



" One other trait which we have not mentioned is 

 iMsperaisteiicy in overcoming obstacles. Nothing daunts 

 him, and the more diffiimlt an end is to attain, so 

 much the more energy and perseverance does he put 

 in its pursuit. A recent instance of this quality we 

 may cite: The fluted scale {Icerya purchasi Maskill) 

 has done immense injury to citrus fruit in southern 

 California of late years. Ascertaining that it is kept 

 in check by natural enemies in its native home, 

 Australia, Dr. Riley foresaw the importance of en- 

 deavoring to introduce these enemies. Not only did 

 Congress refuse to appropriate money for the purpose, 

 but it refused to do away with a clause in the Appro- 

 priation Bill restricting all expenditures to the 

 United Sta,tes. In this state of affairs most men 

 would have given up the fight; but Dr. Eiley, after 

 great trouble, succeeded in accomplishing his end by 

 inducing the Secretary of State to allow the sending 

 of two assistants on the Melbourne Exposition Com- 

 mission, and through their labors the desired result 

 was reached. Hundreds of specimens of an Australian 

 lady-bird {Vedalia cardinalis) were introduced into 

 California, and the dreaded pest is now being speedily 

 reduced to absolute harmlessness. Professor W. A. 

 Henry, of Wisconsin, in a recently-published article, 

 says of this matter, in .speaking of the enthusiasm of 

 the people of California over the results of this im- 

 portation: 'Without doubt it the best stroke ever 

 made by the Agricultural Department at Washing- 

 ton.' " 



It might be thought that all this admin- 



istrative work of the office and in the field 

 would have left little time for pure science 

 or for much general reading or deep think- 

 ing. Let us see what he actually did ac- 

 complish in pure science. Riley's scientific 

 writings will always stand, and show as 

 honest work, thorough -going methods, care 

 and accuracy as his oSice work, and they 

 alone, aside from his practical work, were 

 enough to give him an international repu- 

 tation. In some of his studies he was 

 probably essentially indebted to his assist- 

 ants for specimens and aid in rearing them; 

 in others he evidently depended on his own 

 unaided observations and his skill in draw- 

 ing. He was not ' a species man ' or syste- 

 matist as such; on the contrary his most 

 important work was on the transformations 

 and habits of insects, such as those of the 

 Lepidoptera, locusts and their parasites, his 

 Missouri reports being packed with facts 

 new to science. His studies on the chro- 

 nology of all the broods known of the 17- 

 year cicada, and its tredeeim or 13-year race, 

 carried on through a long succession of 

 years, will prove of lasting value, having 

 intimate bearings on evolution problems. 



His work on the larval characters and 

 hypermetamorphoses of the blister beetles, 

 Epicauta, Macrobasis and Hornia, besides 

 Henous, was thoroughly good and beauti- 

 fully illustrated by his own pencil. He 

 brings forward in this paper a mass of new 

 facts regarding the triungulin, or first larval 

 stage of these beetles, and those succeeding, 

 which he designates as the Carabidoid, the 

 Scarabisidoid stage, the Coarctate or quies- 

 cent larva, these stages preceding the pupa 

 stage. The value of these facts as set forth 

 by so trustworthy and keen an observer, and 

 corroboi-ating and greatly extending those 

 worked out bj^ European observers, is ap- 

 parent when we consider that the triungulin 

 larva is perhaps the nearest approach to the 

 Campodea-like ancestor of the winged in- 

 sects, that the Meloidte are consequently 



