Bibliographical Notices. 273 



regard entomology as consisting in a handsome cabinet with glazed 

 drawers (if made by Standish so much the better), containing rows 

 of good specimens of insects, each with its appropriate label, and 

 feel far greater pleasure in the possession of a rare insect than in the 

 investigation of the most interesting points in the natural history of 

 their favourites. It is no great wonder, perhaps, that ordinary, plain, 

 common-sense people should find some difficulty in realizing the ad- 

 vantages to be derived from the possession of ever so many dry insects 

 stuck through with pins, and thus be led to consider one of the most 

 interesting branches of natural history as a somewhat contemptible 

 study. The existence of this prejudice against the study of ento- 

 mology may probably be one great reason why this science is so little 

 in repute even amongst professed naturalists ; and we believe that 

 nine out of ten of our best zoologists know less of insects than of any 

 other section of the animal kingdom. 



The Lepidoptera, more than any other order of Insects, are the 

 objects of the collector's avidity. The beauty of their forms and 

 colours have rendered them the pets of the "fancy," and of those 

 so-called entomologists who deserve no better name, whose sole 

 happiness consists in possession. Indeed, the well-known tendency 

 of evil communication to corrupt good manners prevails so exten- 

 sively amongst the British Lepidopterists, that it is not easy to find 

 any who are not more or less imbued with what we must call the 

 spirit of "fancy." 



It is therefore with no small gratification that we welcome the 

 appearance in the field of a gentleman who is well known as an 

 earnest and conscientious worker, and who now seems determined to 

 show his brother Lepidopterists that the science of entomology is 

 not synonymous with the art of pinning insects. The group 

 selected by Mr. Stainton, for illustration in the work of which the 

 first volume is now before us, is the extensive tribe or family of the 

 Tineina, a group of Moths generally of very small size, but fre- 

 quently of the most elegant forms and brilliant colours, which present 

 more variety and interest in their oeconomy than any of the other 

 sections of the order. Until of late years these insects were com- 

 paratively little known, the number of species with which the older 

 naturalists were acquainted being very few ; and although many spe- 

 cies have been described by modern authors, cur knowledge of their 

 natural history is still very defective. 



The present volume, which is the first of a long series, contains 

 the natural history of twenty-four species, twenty- one belonging to 

 the genus Nepticula and three to Cemiostoma, In the larva state 

 these insects are all leaf-miners, that is to say, they feed upon the 

 parenchyma of the leaves without injuring the membranes of either 

 surface. The caterpillars of one or two species, however, live in the 

 bark of the twigs of broom. The egg is laid, with very few excep- 

 tions, on the lower side of the leaf, and almost always close to the 

 midrib or one of the stronger nervures ; and it is remarkable that 

 those moths which deposit their eggs upon the twigs of broom select 

 the side of one of the projecting angles of the stem for its reception. 

 The form of the mine formed by the lars^a is very variable : some- 



Am, ^ Mag, N, Hist, Ser. 2. Vol xvii. 18 



