20 
documents laid before the privy council during their investiga- 
tions. 
In Dr. B. S. Barton’s Fragments of the Natural. History of 
Pennsylvunia, issued in 1799, the author announces (p. 23) his 
intention of publishing “a memoir upon that destructive insect 
called the Hessian fly.” It is probable that whatever communi- 
cations were addressed to the committee of the Philosophical so- 
ciety, had been consigned to his hands. We are not aware that 
the promised memoir ever appeared. 
“About the year 1801, the Hessian flies first made their ap- 
pearance in the neighborhood of the city of Richmond. We saw 
but little mischief that year. But in 1802 they were much more 
destructive— 1803, they swept whole fields—about the same in 
1804.” (H. M’Clelland, Amer. Farmer, vol. ii. p. 234.) 
In the year 1803, we arrive at the first notice of this species, of 
a scientific nature. Dr. Mitchell, in a short article in the Medi- 
cal Repository (vol. vii., p. 97, 98), entitled “ Further ravages of 
the wheat insect, or Tipula tritici of America, and of another 
species of Tipula in Europe,” states that it is now understood 
that our insect isa Tipula. He alludes_to the extent of this 
genus, (ninety-four species being enumerated by Weber,) and 
though he has often examined our insect, and bred it so as to ob- 
serve its transformations, he declines giving a decided opinion 
whether or not our species is different from all those that had 
been described. He refers to the species “ treated as a non- 
descript” by the Rev. Mr. Kirby, in the Linnean Transactions, 
copies its name and technical characters, and closes with the re- 
mark, that whether Mr. Kirby’s insect is a new one or not, it is 
not the same animal which has been so injurious in this country. 
Had the doctor but added a few words descriptive of our species, 
he would undoubtedly be entitled to “ the barren honors of a sy- 
nonym.” Respecting the depredations of the insect at this time, 
we learn from him, that “ during the cold and dry spring of 1803 
these creatures again infested the wheat more than they had done 
for many years. Many crops were cut off early in June, and the 
ground plowed up for other purposes.” 
