206 ■ SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL.84 



Count Dejean, General of the Empire and Aide-de-camp to Na- 

 poleon I, was the owner of one of the greatest collections of insects 

 that ever existed. He was an ardent collector, and never lost a chance 

 to add to his collection. Boisduval tells the story that at the battle 

 of Alcanizas, which Dejean won after a very hard fight in Avhich he 

 took a great number of prisoners, he suddenly saw near a little brook a 

 brilliant and rare insect which was lacking in his collection. It was 

 Ccbrio tistulata, and it was resting on a flower. The Count was at the 

 head of his troops, facing the enemy, and was about to give the signal 

 to charge;, but, seeing the insect, he at once dismounted, captured it, 

 pinned it in his helmet, remounted his horse, and gave the order for 

 one of the most vigorous charges of the campaign. After the battle 

 he found that his helmet had been " horriblement maltraite " by a 

 cannon-ball, but his precious Cebrio was recovered intact. 



Boisduval states that all of the soldiers in the regiment commanded 

 by Dejean learned to collect beetles, and each one was given a little 

 vial of alcohol in which all the insects they collected were placed. 

 This eccentricity of his was known to everybody — even to the enemy. 

 So, after a battle, those who found dead soldiers on the field having 

 with them a little bottle containing insects in alcohol, no matter which 

 side won the victory, would always carry the little bottle to General 

 Count Dejean. (Ann. Soc. Ent. Fr. 1845, p. 502.) 



In his zeal as a collector of insects. Gen. E. E. Pradier of the 

 French Army (born in 1813, prominent in African wars and in the 

 war of the Crimea) was almost equal to Dejean. H. Deyrolle relates 

 that once, in Algeria, at the beginning of the French occupation, at 

 a time when there was a price on the head of each Frenchman, 

 Pradier could not resist his collector instincts and often wandered far 

 from camp. One day he was suddenly surrounded by a group of 

 Arabs who made him understand that he should follow them. Resis- 

 tance was not possible — all the more so since he was not armed. But 

 he had taken the precaution to dress in the uniform of a medical 

 officer (that of one of his friends), thinking that there was a chance 

 that he would be respected as a doctor, since the Arabs allowed only 

 men of that profession any facility in coming and going. When they 

 arrived at the first Arab camp he was taken into a tent where there 

 was a Moroccan woman in child labor, and he was told, in his role of 

 physician, to do what was necessary. He was only a lieutenant at the 

 time, and his embarrassment was very great. He did not know 

 whether to try the midwife act or to allow his head to be cut oflf. 

 Suddenly the idea occurred to him to try to make the Bedouins under- 

 stand that he had not the necessary instruments with him and that he 



