before him. The ruling passion was too strong for either time or circumstance: glancing about, as if conscious of the incongruity of the proceeding, he quickly seized his net, bagged the curious specimen, and with a half-guilty look proceeded with the reading. The capture was an important one, as the moth proved to be new to science.
While State Entomologist, his correspondence grew so large as to seriously interfere with other work, and he was at last reluctantly compelled to answer only such letters as were of most importance, devoting the remaining time to research and the preparation of his annual reports. These reports, of which there were thirteen in all, were published in the "Transactions of the State Agricultural Society"; the first nine being also issued in three bound volumes, which were widely circulated both here and abroad, and attracted very favorable attention. His researches were thus brought to the knowledge of foreign entomologists, their value promptly recognized, and the Doctor was soon enrolled as corresponding member of several foreign entomological societies, and later became the recipient of their diplomas, medals, and other testimonials of the appreciation in which his work was held.
The great entomologists of Europe—Westwood and Curtis, of London; Dr. Signoret, of Paris; Dr. Gerstacker, of Berlin; Baron d'Osten-Sacken, of St. Petersburg—were quick to avail themselves of his discoveries, not only by gleaning from his published works, but through the avenue of personal correspondence. His portfolios of foreign correspondence are literally filled with letters of inquiry and acknowledgment from such noted specialists as Dr. Sickel, M. Selys de Lonchamp, and the Abbé Marseul, of France; Professor Boheman, of Sweden; M. Malde, of Germany; and Andrew Murray, of Edinburgh, together with many others of equal reputation.
The success Dr. Fitch achieved was not in any sense the result of favoring circumstances, but the legitimate outcome of his patience in observation and study—study which was always directed by a well-defined plan to a definite object, which as early as 1840 he thus laid down:
"I have undertaken a very great work, and have laid upon myself a task both hard in the plan and difficult in the execution. To unite in one very limited body the most essential facts of the history of insects; to class them with precision and accuracy in a natural series; to delineate the chief traits in their physiognomy; to trace in a laconic and strict manner their distinctive characters, and follow a course which shall correspond with the progress of the science and the eminent men who have contributed to its advancement; to single out the useful and obnoxious species, those which from their manner of living interest our curiosity; to mark the thousand sources where the knowledge of the original authors may be consulted; to render to Entomolo-
