148 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



the interest added is tenfold, while the loss in appearance is of so 

 very little consequence. 



Another advantage the actual labelling of specimens has over 

 all other indirect methods, is that it makes the collection valuable 

 after it leaves the hands of the collector who formed it. I suppose 

 no one knows more about his own collection than did the late 

 Henry Doubleday about his ; yet what is to be learnt from that 

 collection after a certain elementary point has been reached ? It 

 is useful as reference to name species, to see the range of 

 variation in certain species, but there is nothing to tell us 

 whether any particular insect came from the North Pole or the 

 Sahara ; nothing to help us to draw any conclusions from one of 

 the greatest masses of heterogeneous information on Lepidoptera 

 ever collected together. What a different value the collection 

 would have if some system of labelling had been adopted ! 



Many collections with the specimens not labelled, but with a 

 good history, as far as the collector is concerned, are sold in the 

 sale-rooms. They increase the series of the buyers by a few 

 more or less of a species than someone else has, but they have not 

 the least scientific value. " Fine variety, cost £2 at So-and-so's 

 sale," is a common speech ; and that is the only scientific 

 education the buyer has for his money. How much more 

 valuable would such a collection be if every buyer had labels and 

 data with the specimens he bought. He would have something 

 then for study, something for comparison. Again, when a 

 collection is broken up and the individual series are not labelled, 

 but the collector has a diary, the diary must go to one buyer, or 

 perhaps it is not even heard of; certainly it cannot go to all the 

 buyers ; hence it is of little practical value. 



I recently went through Mr. South's fine collection, for the first 

 time ; and although we had never exchanged any views upon the 

 subject, I thought it pointed a very good moral when I saw that 

 he labels his specimens exactly in the same way that I do. 



If this note leads to a discussion, or induces any lepidopterists 

 to adopt a scientific principle in their collections, I shall be more 

 tluiL satisfied. 



Eayleigh Villa, Westcombe Park, S.E., May li, 1888. 



