HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



i77 



•expected to find some interesting insects, and there- 

 fore dismounted every now and then from my 

 stolkjserre to look about; "blue" butterflies 

 abounded everywhere, but turned out to be nothing 

 .more than the familiar Icarus and /Egon, the latter 

 being the commoner of the two ; C. Pamphylus was 

 •also abundant, varying in no way from the British 

 type ; the Fritillaries were represented by Aglaia, 

 and I saw one specimen of some other large Argynnis, 

 which I failed to run down ; my most interesting 

 capture, however, was a beautiful fresh specimen of 

 Polyommatus Hippothoe, on a bed of heartsease ; 

 verily, this is a lovely insect when just out, with 

 its rich red coppery upper surface, shot with violet 

 reflections ; it soon loses its true brilliancy when dead. 

 Not very far from where I took this beautiful 

 butterfly, snow was lying in drifts ten to fifteen feet 

 thick in shaded hollows. 



I do not think I ever saw so many Dor beetles in 

 •one day as I did during this drive ; these insects have 

 a peculiar Scandinavian association for us, our name 

 Dor being simply a corruption of Thor, the great god 

 of Thunder of our Viking ancestors, whose name is 

 also perpetuated to us in the word Thursday or 

 Thors-day. Our Norse forefathers dedicated this 

 beetle to their god Thor, and are said to have held 

 it in high veneration in consequence ; a relic of this 

 survives in some parts of Norway and Sweden to the 

 present day, where the simple-minded peasant will 

 reverently set the poor little beetle upon his feet 

 again, if he finds him lying on his back on the road, 

 passing on with a lighter heart, at any rate, for the 

 kindly deed. Throughout Norway the greatest 

 consideration and kindness is shown for all living 

 creatures, both by young and old. 



At a house up the Romsdal valley I saw a fine 

 bear's skin, obtained in the neighbourhood, but the 

 only wild animal I had the luck to see alive was 

 a wild cat, a handsome looking creature, with a 

 bluish-grey fur and thick short bushy tail. 



At Molde, a place where we saw a panorama of 

 distant snow-capped mountains lit up by the late 

 evening sun, which was a never-to-be-forgotten dream 

 of purple and gold, I did not manage to do any 

 entomological collecting, as the country was soaked 

 with recent heavy rains ; the flora of the neigh- 

 bourhood, however, was wonderfully varied, and 

 vegetation generally marvellously luxuriant. On the 

 hill behind the town I was delighted to find Linnaa 

 borealis growing very abundantly ; this pretty little 

 creeping evergreen, a near ally of the honeysuckle, 

 with its gracefully pendent white flowers, was the 

 special favourite of the great botanist whose name it 

 bears. 



An interesting though necessarily very saddening 

 sight which I was permitted to see at Molde, was the 

 large Lepers' Hospital. One is accustomed to read of 

 this dreadful disease in the Old Testament Scriptures 

 with a vague notion that it was a scourge of olden 



times, having no connection with the nineteenth 

 century ; a visit to the wards at Molde, however, 

 distressingly dissipates this idea. 



Neither at Trondhjem, nor in the Geiranger, had I 

 any opportunity of using my net again in pursuit 

 of butterflies, but, apropos of the latter, I may mention 

 a seemingly rather favourite ornamentation of crosses 

 in the graveyard of Trondhjem Cathedral ; one 

 might almost suppose that Butler's " Analogy " had 

 been translated into Norse, and was a book much 

 studied in the district, for above the inscription on 

 the headstone was frequently engraved his well-known 

 emblem of Life and Immortality — the grub and the 

 butterfly. This was, at any rate, an interesting fact 

 which could not fail to catch the eye of an amateur 

 entomologist. 



A call in at Bergen again completed our short trip 

 in " Gamle Norge," and, in conclusion, I can only 

 say that any naturalist with time at his disposal would 

 find in this glorious country most delightful fields for 

 collecting and investigating, amidst the most wonder- 

 ful and verily grand and awe-inspiring of scenery ; 

 he will probably on his first visit, however, as I 

 myself did, find the scenery so completely absorbing of 

 his receptive faculties, that he will scarcely succeed 

 in taking in many minor details of the country. 



On looking over the few entomological captures I 

 brought home with me, it strikes me as rather a 

 curious thing that, while the long hours of sunshine 

 certainly have such a marked effect upon all flowers 

 in Norway, making them grow to such an abnormal 

 size, and with such extraordinary luxuriance, insect 

 life does not seem to be affected to any appreciable 

 extent in the same way ; probably, however, the 

 excessive moisture of the climate, which is beneficial 

 to plant life, serves to check insect development. 



It is a somewhat remarkable circumstance, too, that 

 although the prolonged sunshine makes all the flowers 

 much brighter in colour, and their scents also very 

 much more powerful than in England, the fruits that 

 ripen in Norway have, for the most part, a decidedly 

 inferior flavour to those grown in this country. 



THE INFLUENCE OF GEOLOGY ON 

 POPULATION. 



By G. W. Bulman, M.A. 



THE influence of the geological structure of a 

 country makes itself felt in various directions. 

 It shows itself in the scenery, and determines whether 

 a district shall be flat and tame, gently undulating 

 and picturesque, or rugged and grand ; it settles 

 which shall be the dominating species of tree, and 

 affects likewise the humbler vegetation ; it is an 

 element in the formation of climate, and may largely 

 affect the rainfall ; finally, it has no small influence 

 on the population. • 



If we draw on a map of Great Britain a line from 



