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Thomas Say was, perhaps, the earliest American entomologist of wide reputation. 

 At any rate, he described insects in all the orders, and was, for a time, an authority in 

 all of them. After Say's death there came a pause in the progress of technical ento- 

 mology. Say's wide knowledge of genera and species in all the orders was inherited by 

 no one singly. But Dr. Harris is not to be reckoned among the successors of Say. Dr. 

 Harris gave a fresh turn, a useful impetus, to the science. Entomology becomes under 

 his hands practical, a positive help to agriculture. The real successors to Say, with 

 •whom commences what I have called the period of renascence in American entomology, 

 sub-divide Say's field and the domain falls into many hands. From a wider view the 

 entomological wave passes from south to north. Commencing at the close of the last 

 century in Georgia with Abbot and the elder Leconte, it reaches Pennsylvania at the 

 beginning of this century with Say, and carries Harris in Massachusetts on its crest 

 before breaking and flooding the continent in all directions. The real successors to Say 

 are Dr. Leconte and, afterwards, Dr. Horn on the Coleoptera ; Cresson, Bassett, Norton 

 and Provancher on the Hymenoptera ; Osten Sacken and Williston on the Diptera ; 

 Scudder and Thomas on the Orthoptera ; Uhler on the Hemiptera, with others, bringing 

 the knowledge of genera and species into a completer shape. The Lepidoptera falls into 

 many hands, anch io son pittore ! There is this about the mere naming and classifying 

 of insects, that, no matter how exactly the work is performed, it carries with it a certain 

 stamp of dilettantism. Only when the scientific knowledge so gained is carried into 

 other domains and made the basis of generalizations upon the laws of life, or when it is 

 carrird into public economy and used to further the practical ends of agriculture, does 

 entomology become a serious science. Say's work, with all its merits, has this flavor of 

 dilettantism about it, and he contents himself with giving a brief description of the Cotton 

 Worm Moth (Aletia argillacea) and Hessian Fly. But Harris, with a much slenderer 

 acquaintance on the whole with the genera and species of insects, lifts his work out of 

 this atmosphere of dilettantism by the turn which he gives to it, and which is hencefor- 

 ward to make one chief development of entomology in America. Practical entomology 

 is to technical entomology what our everyday language is to Latin. There can be no 

 question which is the more useful. In giving Dr. Harris the credit for this turn of the 

 science, one might enquire into the genesis of the idea itself, but it is sufficient for us 

 to celebrate the semi-centennial of its great incorporator. The successors to Dr. Harris 

 and the natural inheritors of his idea are Saunders and Fletcher in the Dominion; Fitch, 

 "Walsh, Riley, LeBaron, Lintner, Comstock, in the States. 



The example set by the Legislature of Massachusetts was not quickly followed, and, 

 as in most public matters in America, private enterprise tided over the '• New England 

 notion " until it received general official recognition. This private help came principally 

 from Philadelphia where Cresson, Blake and others issued the " Practical Entomologist," 

 in the sixties, and of which periodical I was editor for the first few numbers, to be suc- 

 ceeded by the late Mr. Walsh. These unpaid and unofficial exertions did much to pre- 

 pare public sentiment, to bring about the present wholesale recognition on the part 

 of the State of the value of entomological researches. From these unofficial sources, 

 as well as others not here mentioned, together with the issue of the Canadian Entomolo- 

 gist, which began in 1867, came assistance during the years until the Western States 

 should answer the call of Massachusetts, and Illinois in 1868 and Missouri in 1869, ap- 

 point their State Entomologists. Later on Prof. Saunders, in 1883, issued his "Insects 

 injurious to Fruits," of which recently the second edition has appeared, a book which has 

 claims to be placed side by side with the famous treatise of Dr. Harris. 



But the State of New York had, in 1854, taken a step in the same direction. In 

 the Cultivator for June of that year appeared the following paragraph : "The Legisla- 

 ture of this State (i.e. New York) at its late session, placed $1,000 in the hands of the 

 New York State Agricultural Society to be expended in making an examination and 

 description of the insects of this State injurious to vegetation. At a meeting of the 

 Board, Dr. Asa Fitch of Salem, Washington Co., was appointed to carry this object into 

 effect. A better selection could not have been made, and we learn that he is to devote 

 his attent on this season mainly to the investigation of such insects as depredate upon 

 lruit-bearing trees. His report will be looked for with interest and we doubt not will 



