Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 76.djvu/480

476. In company with Riley, then a young man, he had planned much in the way of entomological work; but one report and a few vigorous papers in journals form the total of what remains to us.

his successor in office, was a much less positive character, but an equally conscientious worker, and, in his fourth report, began what was intended to be a popular treatise on the insects, the systematic portion forming a sort of supplement to the specially economic portion. Illinois is another of the states which has never allowed its service to deteriorate, and there is no better work now done in the United States, nor is there a more effective organization than that within its limits.

was a prime factor in the development of economic entomology in the United States. His series of reports on the injurious and other insects of Missouri is a model which has never been exceeded in interest and value. Not the least important feature of these reports is the list of illustrations—wood-cuts most of them—that have never been surpassed in their fidelity to nature, and their artistic merit. Most of the insects figured in Riley's reports look natural, and that is the highest praise that can be given to any figure of this type. So well done are they that they have become common stock and are used again and again in bulletins and reports throughout the country. With his transfer to Washington his field of activity was enlarged, and he became a force in the development of the practical side of entomological work. The real development of our present battery of spraying outfits, arsenical poisons and kerosene emulsions began under Riley, and the fight to secure their adoption was a more difficult one than is understood. Congress thought itself very liberal when it reached the $20,000 mark for the division of entomology, and when we consider the force of men that Riley gathered and trained for that sum, men who form the nucleus of the division to the present day, we begin to appreciate the ability of the man.

I will not attempt to give a list of the men who were associated with Dr. Riley in the development of his office at Washington; I knew them all and worked with some of them for a time. And not the least of Dr. Riley's ability was in getting all that there was out of his assistants, in commanding their devotion and loyalty, although he constantly quarrelled with every one of them. He was the best loved, best hated, most admired and most detested man I ever knew; but he was always a better friend than he was an enemy, and never lost an opportunity to do a man a good turn even when he personally lost by it. Economic entomology owes much to Dr. Riley and his influence is still with us. I need hardly say that his successor has fully maintained the standard set for him, and that there is nowhere in the world at the present time a more efficient body of workers in economic