126 THE ENTOMOLOGISTS RECORD. 



insects he reared for these purposes. The hardships of his early 

 life led him to put a money value on every insect he captured, and 

 herein, perhaps, he was not very different from those whose lots have 

 been cast in easier places. For some years he openly dealt in insects, 

 buying and selling all the reputed British species, as Stevens' cata- 

 logues show. Of late years he had been much more successful in 

 business matters, and gave up selling insects, in fact, he was a frequent 

 buyer at Stevens' salerooms himself. When a lad he lost one eye 

 (blown out when shooting), but to the last he could see as much with 

 the other one as most people can with two. How keenly the competi- 

 tive method of collecting lepidoptera had hold of him may be surmised 

 from the following extract from a letter written only two months 

 before his death. Rewrites: " When I was working at Northtieet 

 I used to walk in to Dartford every morning before work, in order to 

 be first at the fence for Aleiicis pictaria.'" He was also very keen on 

 the rare Lepidoptera. Only a few days before his death (Jan. 27th) 

 he writes : " Have you seen in the Kntnm. the advt. of ' old ' Xi/ssia 

 lapponaria ? I wrote to the advertiser the day after the advertise- 

 ment appeared, but have had no reply. I asked how they came to be 

 ' old.' Had the advertiser had them by him, as N. zonaria, without 

 knowing what they were?" The addition of a species not in his 

 collection was to him a matter of joy beyond description. We received 

 at least three letters during the fortnight before bis death, begging 

 for information as to where he could get a specimen of Jiliodop/taea 

 rnbrotibiella and O.ri/ptilits hleracif, the former at best but a doubtful 

 species, the latter probably never really taken in Britain. The mania 

 to obtain new species led him oftentimes to describe odd specimens 

 that he could not at once determine, as such, and hence he incurred 

 the contempt of some micro-lepidopterists for his precipitate haste. 

 At the same time, he really has made some notable additions to the 

 British lists, and his energy and capacity for hard Avork are worthy of 

 all praise. Compared with some of the dilettanti entomologists of 

 the present time, to whom field work, with the exception of going for 

 special rare and local species for exchange, is unknown, J. B. Hodg- 

 kinson was an enlightened naturalist. He was well versed in the life- 

 histories of a very great number of micro-lepidoptera, and his obser- 

 vations on the Tineina — Tyithocollftix, XepticnJa and FJachista — only 

 ended with his death. The poverty of his early life, the long hours 

 of work for a bare subsistence, the accident which left him with his 

 sight impaired, had no power to check his entomological ardour, and 

 he stands out clearly an example to men whose lots have been cast in 

 pleasanter places, whose professional duties leave them much com- 

 parative leisure, and yet who not only have no knowledge of 

 Neptinila and Lithocnlletia, but could not even tell the name of a 

 Crambus or a Pyrale, and whose knowledge of the ToRTRicmEs is 

 only equalled by the ignorance of those who scoff' at " bug hunters." 



By the death of J. B. Hodgkinson, at the age of seventy-four, we 

 have lost an entomologist " of the old school," one of those collectors 

 whose every spare moment was spent in the open fields, and who 

 learned by observation of actual objects the facts of their existence. 

 For that old school we have every respect. It served its purpose — a 

 good purpose — and has enabled us, by its accumulation of facts, to 

 progress at a rapid rate in the more philosophical branches of our 



