290 Forty-first Report on the State Museum. 



Entomological Libraries. 



A reference to some of the entomological libraries of the United States should be of 

 interest as showing the aid found necessary or desirable to our students in the 

 prosecution of their studies. 



The first in importance is that of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Cambridge, 

 Massachusetts, having assumed that rank from the incorporation with it of the private 

 library of Dr. Hagen. It is rich in works on Neuroptera, in Bibliography, and in ana- 

 tomical, physiological and biological papers. It is judged to contain about 2,000 

 volumes and 3,000 pamphlets. 



Harvard College library contains about 450 volumes. 



The Public Library of Boston has about 650 volumes, nearly all standard works and 

 taut few pamphlets. 



The Boston Society of Natural History reports about 900 volumes and 550 pamphlets. 

 About one-third of these formerly constituted the private library of Dr. Harris. 



The Astor Library of New York has about 500 volumes. 



The Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences has over 500 volumes and about as many 

 pamphlets. 



The library of the American Entomological Society at Philadelphia is said to 

 consist of 1,728 volumes, inclusive of some general works but in part relating to 

 entomology. 



The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 956 volumes and 55i pamphlets. 



The Peabody Institute at Baltimore, over 800 volumes. 



Of private libraries may be mentioned the following: That of Mr. Scudder, of 765 

 volumes and nearly 2,000 pamphlets, rich in works on the Orthoptera, butterflies, fossil 

 insects, and the anatomy and embryology of insects. 



Profes'^or Riley's library contains about 700 volumes and 3,000 pamphlets, largely of 

 biological and economic publications. 



Dr. LeConte's library, -which has been scattered since his death, was mainly in 

 Coleoptera, and contained 700 volumes and 800 pamphlets. 



Dr. Packard's library, of 470 volumes and 500 pamphlets, has a special value in 

 its embryological and morphological works. 



Mr. Uhler's library, selected with special reference to his studies of the Hemiptera, 

 contains over 300 volumes and 500 pamphlets. 



The above items are drawn from a publication by Mr. Scudder in 1880, entitled " The 

 Entomological Libraries of the United States." Since its compilation, large additions 

 have doubtless been made to each one of the libraries. 



Palj?;ontological Entomology. 

 Notwithstanding the abundant wealth of our insect fauna, ever yielding discovery of 

 previously unknown forms, while unnamed and unclassified material is an embarrass- 

 ment in all of our large collections, the ancestors of these myriad forms have not been 

 permitted to lie neglected in the beds of rock that have held their forms for countless 

 ages. The discovery, several years ago (in 1867), in the Rocky mountains, of beds of 

 fossil insects of unsurpassed richness, has given both the opportunity for, and the 

 impetus to, their study. During the past twenty years Mr. S. H. Scudder has devoted 

 much time to the fossil insects occurring in the Devonian rocks of New Brunswick, and 

 in the carboniferous, triassic and tertiary beds of the western States and territories, as 

 may appear from a list of sixty-four publications upon these and European forms, 

 published by him up to 1882. Some tertiary beds of a lake basin at Florissant, in Colo- 

 rado, have proved far more prolific of insect remains than any others in the world. 

 About 12,000 specimens have been taken from them, representing each of the general 

 seven orders of insects, while hundreds of thousands have been left behind. Among 

 them was the first fossil butterfly ever found in America (nine were known from the 

 tertiaries of Europe), and the most perfect one ever found. It is described as "in a 

 wonderful state of preservation, the wings expanded as if ready for the cabinet, and 



