28 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



million five hundred thousand, a considerable portion of which there 

 is reason to suppose may be found in North America. To collect, 

 arrange, and study such a vast number of objects requires a cor- 

 responding number of co-laborers; but fortunately for the advance of 

 entomology, wherever a taste for it has been awakened, its votaries 

 outnumber those of almost any other branch of natural history. 

 There is scarcely one, says Osten Sacken, which offers equal facilities 

 to the student who prosecutes its study — scarcely one which is so apt 

 to become a favorite with every class of persons; and there is none, 

 even botany not excepted, in which the mere gratification of taste 

 can be so well combined with real scientific usefulness. It is adapted 

 to every condition of life, because the specimens take up very little 

 space, and require but trifling expense in collecting them; to every 

 degree of education, for the number of insects being inexhaustible, 

 any schoolboy may make collections or observations of great value to 

 the more scientific investigator; it can be combined with almost any 

 other pursuit, and can at any time be laid aside to be resumed at a 

 more favorable moment. 



Advancement of knowledge, however, naturally precedes its diffu- 

 sion; therefore, before attempting to awaken a taste for the pursuits 

 of entomological studies, it was necessary to bring this branch of 

 natural history, as far as it relates to this continent, to a greater de- 

 gree of perfection than that to which it had attained. American en- 

 tomology is in this respect, as we are informed, far behind American 

 botany. The systematical knowledge of the plants indigenous to the 

 settled parts of North America is almost brought to perfection, and 

 excellent manuals have been prepared, making it comparatively easy, 

 even for a beginner, to identify most of the plants he may find. Not 

 so with entomology; by far the greater number of our insects 

 are still undescribed. The publications on American entomology 

 are scattered through a great number of scientific transactions, most 

 of which are in foreign languages, and therefore inaccessible to the 

 many who would otherwise be interested in the study. 



The first object of the Institution was, therefore, to collect and 

 present in a compact and condensed form the existing knowledge; 

 next, to increase this knowledge by encouraging further research by 

 scientific men, so as to bring this branch of science to a certain degree 

 of completeness and of symmetry in its different parts, and not until 

 after this was accomplished to attempt its general diffusion. This 



