248 The Field Naturalist's Quarterly Nov. 



&c., and a little less to the investigation of minutiae, we feel 

 certain that they would earn the sincere gratitude of those 

 in whose interest they have taken office. 



Secretaries have sometimes told us that they can get 

 papers or lectures only from those of their members who 

 are specially interested in some original work, the results of 

 which they wish to communicate. We can only say that 

 in our opinion this is beginning at the wrong point. The 

 field naturalist who would be a teacher to his fellow- 

 members must first recognise that before he can expect 

 his observations to be understood or appreciated, he must 

 be quite sure that his hearers are familiar with the general 

 principles by which he himself has been guided in his 

 work, and with the most important facts which have been 

 previously established. 



\^ ■^/- \^/ \t/ x^/' 



/yv /yv /|\ ./|v /fv 



In our next issue we hope to publish the first instalment 

 of a new feature of the journal. We have for a long time 

 felt the advisability of collecting together in one table all 

 the most important and interesting records of species which 

 have recently been recorded. At the present moment, if one 

 wishes to ascertain how often and in what localities any 

 rare species has been observed in 1902, it is necessary to 

 search through the columns of some dozen or more papers 

 to gain the information. In future that somewhat tedious 

 process will be done by a good many willing helpers for the 

 columns of this journal. The double advantage of this to 

 our readers will be that not only will they find at one 

 searching what records there have been in the quarter, but 

 they will also see where these were published and the date, 

 so that they can obtain for themselves the copy of the 

 journal in which the record appeared and read the full 

 account therein. 



The information that our column will give will be simply 

 the name of the species (scientific and common), the locality 

 of observation, the date of observation, the observer's name, 

 and the title of the journal to which the observation was 

 sent or in which it appeared. For all other particulars 

 readers must refer to the original source. 



