She kneels to you-cast over her naked shoulders the mantle of your charity-place in her left hand the staff of life; and into her right, give the cup of science gleaming with the liquid ruby of intellectual energy: as she drains the ethereal fluid, that magical cup is suddenly transformed into a cornucopia or horn of plenty, shedding the richest fruits in prodigal abundance. She smites the impenetrable granite, and from the rugged rock gush forth the abundant waters of life-she raises her eyes aloft, and it rains bread like manna from Heaven. Over her wave the banner proudly inscribed "Excelsior" — higher, still higher! "Descent to us is adverse; in our proper motion, we ascend." To waver, to pause, is in fact to retrograde; we should not think anything accomplished until the eminence is attained. It may be that our course at present is per aspera ad astra, but it is motion that gives stability to the Universe. Let the Empire State be indeed imperial in her port, her progress, and her munificence. Let her exercise a just discrimination in the objects of her bounty-but let her bear in mind that she gives to all when she gives to Agriculture. PRIZE ESSAYS OF THE NEW-YORK STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 1843. A TREATISE ON INSECTS INJURIOUS TO FIELD CROPS, FRUIT ORCHARDS, VEGETABLE GARDENS, AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS: WITH A DESCRIPTION OF EACH, AND THE BEST METHODS OF DESTROYING THEM OR PREVENTING THEIR RAVAGES. PREPARED FOR THE NEW-YORK STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY: BY WILLIS GAYLORD, PREFACE. In presenting to the Agricultural Public the following notices of the principal Insects that are injurious to the Farmer and Orchardist, the writer lays claim to little more merit than that of endeavoring to prepare from the labors of other men more scientific than himself, a useful Manual on this important subject; adding to the facts he has drawn from the stores of others, such corroborative or original ones as the experience and observation of some forty years spent on a farm may have afforded. Utility has been his object; and if he has succeeded in that, he will be happy in the belief that the labor bestowed has not been in vain. The writer feels he should be unjust, were he not to acknowledge the great obligations he has been under in preparing the following pages, to the labors of Wilson, Say, Kōllar, Harris, and others, whose works have been consulted; as well as to the pages of the American Journal of Science, the New-England Farmer, the old Genesee Farmer, and the Albany Cultivator. |