114 THE entomologist's RECORD. 



hundred figures of P. ajiollo, executed with that beauty and finish that 

 one has become so used to in these Ktiides that one ahiiost fails tO' 

 notice how excellent it fs. The text is introduced by some forty odd 

 pages occupied with one of those charming excursions, partly historical, 

 partly biographical, with which M. Oberthiir sometimes favours us. 

 Recalling how in vol. iv., in the dedication to his grandson, he 

 expressed the spirit which animated his later works, he now tells us how 

 50 years ago he first captured P. apnllo in the Cevennes, and thereon 

 discussed this form with his grandfather, in comparison with those 

 taken in Fribourg. The transition is easy to reminiscences not altogether 

 entomological, and he proceeds to give his fifteen grandchildren the 

 chief points in the traditions left by their forbears. He is certainly 

 correct in believing that his readers will find the presentation of these 

 memories of the family and the family profession, in a work that 

 relates to entomologists almost as much as to entomology, neither 

 irrelevant nor uninteresting. 



The author's grandfather Francois Jacques Oberthiir was born in 

 Strasburg in 1793. He was an excellent artist, learned in human 

 anatomy, eminent in miniature-painting and as an engraver on copper. 

 At Fribourg, he directed artistic works for the publisher Herder, and 

 there he devoted himself to Entomology. He often told his grandson 

 of the chase of P. apollo in the mountains near Fribourg, and loved to 

 relate to him the delights of collecting in the Black Forest. Did 

 space permit it would be interesting to transfer to the Bhit. llecord 

 much of the account of the invention of Lithography by Aloys 

 Senefelder, and of the association with him of F. J. Oberthiir. There 

 is even a legend that an Oberthiir was the friend of Gutenberg, who 

 had no more devoted fellow-worker. 



M. Oberthiir exclaims that the most imperative and honourable 

 duty of his descendants is to carry on the art of typographical and 

 lithographic printing which their ancestors practised in company with 

 such illustrious inventors. In this interesting relation we find M. 

 Oberthiir still displays strongly the poetic disposition, which Avas already 

 evident in his report on the Excursion of the Entomological Society of 

 France to the Cevennes in 1863 {Ann. Soc. Ent. Fr., 1864), a report 

 full of an ardent admiration of nature, as of scientific and business 

 detail. 



The discussion of the western forms of Pamafntiini apnllo is very full. 

 It appears that the race at Vernet-les-Bains is characterised by having 

 a great diversity of forms, forms that are in other localities, local, 

 distinctive and defined. In contrast with this polymorphic race of 

 the Eastern Pyrenees, forms such as cscalerae, lozerae, iiidliciilut< and 

 siciliae have each a very constant and comparatively uniform facias. 

 The discussion of the various western races is very complete, and 

 the figures render the text most easy to appreciate. M. Oberthiir 

 finishes the narrative with a hope of some time dealing with the 

 Eastern forms in similar fashion, but the very large mass of material, 

 which he says is necessary to do this adequately, indefinitely postpones 

 this further monument of scientific ardour. 



Fasc. IX. (1st Partie) contains further figures of Phalaenites 

 described by Guenee, two figures of varieties of Artn/nniH pandora, one 

 a rather remarkable one, lilicina, Obthr. There are also six plates of 

 the types of Lepidoptera of California described by Boisduval in 1852 



