334 
[Assembly 
It was on the 24th of June in this year, that Mr. Say read before 
the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences a paper entitled 
u Some account of the insect known by the name of Hessian fly, 
and of a parasitic insect that feeds on it.” Thig contains an accu¬ 
rate technical description of the insect, on which he bestows the 
name of Cecidomyia destructor, and also of its most common para¬ 
site, referred by him to the genus Ceraphron, and also named des¬ 
tructor. This paper was published in the Journal of the Academy 
(vol. i. p. 45-48), issued in the course of the ensuing month, and 
was followed in August by a copperplate illustration of these in¬ 
sects, drawn and engraved by Mr. C. A. Le Sueur. “ A local habi¬ 
tation and a name” were thus conferred upon this world-renowned 
species, by which it has ever since been definitely specified and ar¬ 
ranged in works of science. 
In the American Monthly Magazine and Critical Review for 
August, 1817, New-Yorlc, (vol. i. p. 275-279,) appeared a paper 
bearing the title, <! An account of the wheat insect of America, or 
the Tipula vaginalis tritici, commonly called the Hessian fly.” 
This paper gives the substance of Judge Havens’s memoir, and pro¬ 
fesses to copy a technical name and description which had been pub¬ 
lished by Dr. Mitchell in the Ncw-Yorlc Gazette of July 3d. But 
whoever refers to the New-Yorlc Gazette , will find no attempt at a 
technical description, and no name except that of Tipula Tritici , 
which is in one instance, casually as it were, made use of. The 
word vaginalis is therefore an interpolation of the writer in the 
Magazine-, and as he, at least on some subsequent occasions, re¬ 
frained from bringing this name farther into notice, when a fair op¬ 
portunity was presented him for doing so (as editor of Hooper's 
Medical dictionary , fyc.) we doubt not, when the excitement of the 
day was past, he deeply regretted that he had ever drawn up an 
article so derogatory to himself as that which appears in the Maga¬ 
zine. We should therefore suppress all allusion to this subject, 
with the hope that it might pass wholly into oblivion, but that the 
article from the Magazine has of late years been copied into some 
of our agricultural journals, and has been referred to in terms of 
commendation by some names of respectability. With the curren¬ 
cy thus unfortunately given to it, it will be read by hundreds who 
can never see the New-York Gazette , and will thus deem, that one- 
