Bibliographical Notices. 367 



to stimulate them to further inquiries, " the object of which is to 

 interpret truthfully and earnestly those records of past creations, the 

 memorials of which exist within our reach, although buried and ob- 

 scured in the ground beneath our feet." 



Besides the illustrations of fossils and diagrams, the work is accom- 

 panied with an outline geological map of the neighbourhood of Lon- 

 don, and section of the Drift and London Tertiary strata. 



A Catalogue of the Lepidopterous Insects in the Museum of the Hon, 

 East India Company. By Thomas Horsfield, M. and Ph.D., 

 F.R.S., Keeper of the Company's Museum, and Frederic Moore, 

 Assistant. Vol. I. Printed by Order of the Court of Directors. 

 London, 1857. 8vo, pp. v and 316, and 18 Plates. 



The recent opening of the very extensive and splendid additional 

 Museum in the East India House, and the publication of the volume 

 before us, at a time when the Hon. Company itself is overshadowed 

 by so dense a political cloud, are circumstances which speak volumes 

 for the energy of the Company and the activity of its servants. 



Thirty years ago, the veteran naturalist whose name first appears 

 on the title-page of the work above noticed, published two Parts of a 

 Treatise on the Lepidopterous Insects of Java, the materials for 

 which had been collected by himself, comprising a truly valuable 

 series of illustrations of the transformations of a great number of 

 highly interesting species of butterflies. The plan on which the 

 work was published, we are now told by the author, could not ensure 

 public support. It was in fact far too costly and elaborate, and conse- 

 quently the publication of it was discontinued after two Parts had 

 appeared in 1828 and 1829. The materials, however, which those two 

 numbers contained were of the utmost value for a true classification of 

 the Order, consisting as they did not only of truthfully executed illus- 

 trations of the transformations, but also of elaborate analyses of the 

 perfect insects themselves. Entomologists therefore who felt an interest 

 in the subject beyond the mere possession of a cabinet of specimens, 

 regretted the discontinuance of the work, and the non-publication of 

 the abundant materials remaining in the portfolios of the author. 

 Time, however, wore on, and the system of Catalogues published by 

 the Trustees of the British Museum induced the Hon. Company to 

 commence the publication of a similar series of Catalogues of the con- 

 tents of their Museum. Several of these have appeared, and now we 

 have before us the first volume of the Entomological Series, in which 

 the whole of the Eastern Diurnal and Crepuscular Lepidoptera, six 

 hundred and fifty in number, are catalogued, accompanied with 

 coloured illustrations of their transformations, occupying twelve 

 crowded plates, together with six plates filled with figures of new 

 species. Not only are the whole of Dr. Horsfield's own collection 

 of drawings of the transformations of the Javanese species of these 

 two divisions now published, but also several valuable series of similar 

 drawings of continental Indian species by A. Grote, Esq., Lady 



