NOTES ON COLLECTING, ETC. 299 



winter, and on the plant in summer ; A. herbigrada, very common on 

 nearly every piece of uncultivated ground on the chalk : Phyllotreta 

 nodicornis, a few on Reseda ; Thyamis pusilla ; T. piciceps ; T. gracilis, 

 the last two on Senecio Jacobcece ; Cassida vibex (2), on thistles ; C. 

 equestris on Mintha aquatica. Many of the above insects were taken in 

 Bucks ; nearly half the district worked being in that county. Some of 

 the best parts of the district (entomologically speaking) are very strictly 

 preserved ; but I had free access to these, owing to the courtesy of the 

 principal landowners. — E. G. Elliman, Westcroft, Tring. 



Rarities and Exchangers. — We have received during the past two 

 months several communications from subscribers asking whether we 



thought that Mr. of was to be relied on for the supply of such 



species as Hadenasatura,Xy/omiges conspicillaris, JVonagria sparganii,eic. 

 as British rarities. Now, from the commercial point of view on which 

 many amateur entomologists arrange exchanges with strangers, the fact 

 remains that no one takes these and equally rare species in sufficient quan- 

 tities to arrange an exchange in such species, and those who do not know 

 the gentlemen personally who take these and similar species are only aid- 

 ing fraudulent persons in getting rid of such species as British by adver- 

 tising for them. It is the collector's place, even if he have no interest in 

 entomology as a science, to keep himself au fait with these things, but a 

 glance at the exchange lists in all our magazines is sufficient to show how 

 ignorant in this matter some of our collectors are. They appear to take a list 

 and write off: — '''■Desiderata. — Boitica,arion ^euphorbia, pulchellajlicifolia, 

 purpuraria, sacraria, cannce, spargatiii, conspicillaris, conformist etc. Oc- 

 casionally ^'daplidice, antiopa,musculosa,scutosa,erytJirocepJkala, oleagina, 

 ostrina, paula, parva, circellata, strigaria, fuliginaria and ononaria " are 

 added. And then the writers of such lists of desiderata complain that a 

 certain class of collectors cheat them. Is it not palpably their own 

 fault, and do not the lists of duplicates they themselves offer prove 

 their ignorance? It is of course deplorable that in the study of 

 entomology there are men who are willing to supply so-called British 

 specimens of these species to a collector for some local species which 

 he foolishly considers is an equivalent, and so, perhaps, it is, as it leaves 

 a fraudulent person a monetary margin between the value of the foreign 

 specimen and that of the local species he gets in exchange, but not from the 

 British standpoint. A Continental specimen of ostrina, paula, parva, 

 fuliginaria, ononaria, etc. has a commercial value equal to such British 

 species as hyperborca, sobrina, bombyliformis, convolviili, or any of our most 

 desired local species, and therefore, the exchanger gets a quid pro quo, 

 perhaps a good one, but not what he pretends that he expects. It is 

 not our province to point out those of our friends who take our rarest 

 insects. Generally they are entomologists, and not simply collectors, 

 and would not thank us to subject them to the annoyance of receiving 

 letters offering them euphrosyne, seletie, festiva, brunnea and other 

 species which occur in their own gardens, for the specimens which they 

 prefer to give to those entomologists with whom they have a personal 

 acquaintance. Collectors who exchange on a commercial basis can 

 make a collection up to a certain point, but that they can ever hope to 

 finish their collection is ridiculous. All ^dJ/z^Tf^e collectors know that 

 the British rarities of such collectors are a fraud, and that they have no 

 actual value. There must be many collectors who have never read 



