1882.] Economic Entomology . 209 
produce of the farmer and the gardener, and consequently, 
pro tanto , they impoverish the community at large. The 
losses occasioned by the Phylloxera in France and the adja- 
cent countries, by the Rocky Mountain locust and the 
potato-beetle in the United States, are matters of general 
notoriety. So thoroughly have the people of America been 
impressed with the magnitude of the damage inflicted by 
these and other vermin, that several of the States have ap- 
pointed official entomologists whose duty it is to examine 
into the habits and the life-history of every inseCt found to 
be noxious, with a view of devising ways and means for its 
destruction. In this manner such an amount of benefit has 
been already effected that our thoroughly practical kinsmen 
across the Atlantic recognise the outlay thus incurred as a 
good investment. More than this ; they see that a know- 
ledge of Entomology is exceedingly valuable to the farmer 
and the planter. We in England have not taken any similar 
steps. If the nation, or any portion thereof, needs che- 
mical, physical, botanical, or zoological advice, we are ac- 
customed to expeCt that men of Science will not merely give 
their time and labour gratuitously, but even undertake costly 
experiments and observations without the prospeCt of remu- 
neration. We have hitherto not fared badly on this system, 
unreasonable as it must be pronounced. Nor do we recom- 
mend the appointment of, e.g., county-entomologists in 
England. Were such offices created we fear they would be 
filled by men who have passed brilliant examinations in all 
manner of subjects, especially in such as are glaringly irre- 
levant, but who are utterly useless in research, and whose 
crammed minds are void of suggestiveness. The writer of 
the book before us is worth a score of examinees. 
It must be at once admitted that inseCt plagues are less 
rife here than in America, or, indeed, than in most parts of 
the great continents. Our chilly summers, our cloudy skies, 
and the general uncertainty of our climate, are not, upon 
the whole, favourable to the development of inseCt-life. We 
are poorer both in species and individuals than are most 
countries situate between the same parallels of latitude, or 
enjoying the same average temperature. Nevertheless the 
injuries which our crops sustain from “ creeping things” are 
far from trifling, and deserve especial attention now the 
farming interest has suffered so much from a succession of 
ungenial seasons.* Perhaps in the long run the extirpation 
* Those who consider that our climate has undergone latterly a change for 
the worse are reminded that Shakspeare (“ Midsummer Night’s Dream,” 
