350 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



acter for the National Museum. The danger of attempting 

 general revisions and monographic work with insufficient material 

 and literature, and the liability of such work to conflict with con 

 temporary work of others better prepared with material and 

 literature could be illustrated by several recent instances. The 

 result has always been a large increase in the number of 

 synonyms and duplication of species. In the same connection 

 mention was made of other instances of work in practically the 

 same field being carried on by widely separated individuals, one 

 or both laboring under the same difficulties of insufficient mate 

 rials and facilities for good work. 



Mr. Otto Heidemann presented a note entitled " Exhibition of 

 Drawings of certain rare Capsids," in which he pointed out some 

 of the characters used by European authors to distinguish the 

 species and genera in Capsidae, and showed their applicability to 

 American species, illustrating his remarks with some very care 

 ful and artistic drawings of rare CapsidaB. He described, also, 

 his method of making these drawings. He said that at first he 

 had attempted to make drawings by the use of the camera lucida, 

 but was dissatisfied with the results, and now thoroughly studied 

 the specimen with the aid of a hand lens until he was able to 

 make a drawing of it from memory. This was first done greatly 

 enlarged and afterwards reduced to the size desired. Professor 

 Riley endorsed Mr. Heidemann's method, and said he believed 

 that the true method of drawing, for natural history purposes, 

 was first to so thoroughly study the specimen that it could be 

 accurately drawn from memory in detail. He said also that he 

 believed the drawings should represent the individual specimen 

 rather than be a composite representing variations which occur in 

 the species. The differences in various individuals, he thought, 

 should be either pointed out in the descriptive matter or in addi 

 tional side figures. Dr. Gill also urged that illustrations should 

 represent individual specimens, except where the specimen which 

 was best suited for illustration happened to be, for any reason, 

 mutilated. The mutilated portion could be restored from some 

 other specimen, but the restored part should be pointed out in the 

 descriptive matter accompanying the illustration. 



Mr. Howard presented the following : 



