New Publications. 395 



range of temperature and atmospheric pressure arising from the 

 inequalities of elevation, afford appropriate localities to species 

 of very different habits, and thus present, as it were, a kind of 

 microcosmic view of British Entomology. The indented shores 

 of our beautiful and far-flowing Frith, offer an extended field 

 for the occurrence of littoral species, and such as affect a sandy 

 soil ; while the Pentland Hills, attaining, even in their nearer 

 range, to any elevation exceeding 1700 feet, produce examples 

 of the kinds more characteristic of heathy grounds or upland 

 pastures. The intermediate and undulating plains are rich in 

 gardens, and other grounds of varied culture, and are intersect- 

 ed by occasional streams, the banks of which, sloping or preci- 

 pitous, exhibit a diversified vegetation, favourable to the occur- 

 rence of numerous forms of insect life. Although the district is 

 not richly wooded, yet there are many belts of thriving planta- 

 tions, and even occasional groups of " old ancestral trees," among 

 whose leafy umbrage, we doubt not, many of the woodland tribes 

 still remain to be discovered. 



The only previous contributions to Scottish Entomology with 

 which we are acquainted, are Mr Stewart's " List of Insects found 

 in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh,*" which contain scarcely 

 more than a hundred species of coleoptera ; and Mr Duncan's 

 " Catalogue of Coleopterous Insects/' from the same vicinity, 

 in which the amount was at onte extended to nearly 550. 

 These papers were published in the Werjierian Memoirs^ 

 vol. i. p. 566y and vol. vi. p. 443. The joint-volume now pub- 

 lished by Messrs Wilson and Duncan, contains, we observe, be- 

 tween 600 and 700 species ; and we doubt not, from the impulse 

 which a work executed with such accuracy and intelligence is 

 likely to give to the subject, that great accessions will hencefor- 

 ward be made from year to year. Besides the description and 

 history of the species captured in the Edinburgh district, the 

 work contains the names and localities of air the coleopterous in- 

 sects hitherto known to have been seen in Scotland ; so that, 

 while its principal portion, relating to a limited sphere, will be 

 chiefly useful within those limits, its incidental notices of nume- 

 rous other species, will render it interesting even to those at a 

 distance, especially to such as feel the value of every contribu- 

 tion to our knowledge of zoological geography. In truth, the 



