CURRENT NOTES. 



Ill 



whilst that of the species is often wanting in dates (without reference 

 to the list of authors to whom reference is made). Of the economy of 

 most of the species nothing whatever is known, and where a species 

 has been bred, reference is rarely given to the original record, and one 

 has to take the author largely on trust, «'.//., when he says that Ho/ilis- 

 inenus pfrni(i(»<iix "has been bred on the continent from the pupa of 

 Satyms maera and from Aspilates stririillana," for there is nothing to 

 guide one to the original records to which one would be glad to refer 

 for details. That the book will have as wide a circulation as Htainton's 

 Manual is hardly to be expected, but it will serve exactly the same 

 purpose as did that book half-a-century ago; it will enable students to 

 get a general grip of the more modern views of the classification of the 

 Tchneunionvlae, based on external structural characters of the imago, it 

 will help them to name a species whose life-history they have probably 

 followed up with care, and enable them to publish the facts under the 

 name that the species bears, and, if the other volumes be rapidly com- 

 pleted, will be considered by the present-day collector as the tinisbed 

 scientific work of his life beyond which one need not go, and inter- 

 ference with which (by addition or correction) will be held a cardinal 

 sin, reminding one of those dear old lepidopterological friends, who 

 forget that they are growing old or regret it, who weep at the 

 changes in the Doubleday " List," . and at the variations from 

 Stainton's Manual, and fail to see that only the dear old List 

 and Manual have enabled the collectors of the last half-century 

 to amass the material scattered through the magazines, all of 

 which has so little scientific value until collected, sifted and rebuilt 

 into a whole, that even the most blind must see marks progress, even 

 though they fail to understand it. Morley's book is a pioneer book, a 

 book to be backed and supported by all entomologists who wish to see 

 English entomology hold its place in the advance that is taking place 

 in knowledge all over the world, supported out of the public funds in 

 America, dependent upon the generosity of the educated in Britain. 

 To Mr. Ernest A. Elliott, who has, we understand, guaranteed the cost 

 of publication, and who is prepared to allow Mr. Morley to carry to 

 completion the remaining live (we believe) volumes, if only expenses 

 be paid, the thanks of all entomologists are due, whilst Mr. Keys 

 deserves a word of praise for the get up and printing of the book, 

 which is, as might be supposed when printed by an entomologist, 

 almost entirely without the ghastly printer's errors with which the 

 most careful author's work is too frequently studded. 



Mr. J. H. Turner has indexed Parts I and II of Practical Hints for 

 the Field Lcpidojiterist, and offered it to us for publication. Its utility 

 is undoubted, but it appears to be inadvisable to publish this alone, as 

 the sale is so uncertain. If, however, 120 subscribers will send in 

 their names for a Part III to be published during the current year, 

 with an index to the three parts included, it would be worth while under- 

 taking the matter. The unusually successful sale of Parts I and II 

 leads one to suppose that this small section of our subscribers will 

 guarantee the work. We should be glad of names, which we will 

 publish from time to time until the number is obtained. 



We understand that the Rev. C. R. N. Burrows (The Vicarage, 

 Mucking, Essex) is finding some difficulty in obtaining from lepidop- 

 terists, detailed information of the minor variation of the imagines of 



