THE SEASONS. 3 



production hereafter — so with the winter of the Entomologist : 

 the almost entire cessation of out-door Entomological labours 

 drives him to look over and study his collection, and sets him 

 a re-reading his Entomological books, and he is surprised to 

 find how much more pregnant with meaning they now ap- 

 pear than they did the previous winter ; many passages of 

 which he did not gather the full purport before, now he at 

 once understands, because they confirm some of his own ex- 

 perience during the past season : he makes notes of insects to 

 be looked for at particular times and in particular places 

 during the ensuing season, consults the herbarium of some 

 friend, and rubs up his Botanical knowledge in order that 

 he may learn to know some particular plants, on which he 

 finds some caterpillars are only to be found. Grant that 

 during mid-winter the Entomologist says daily, " Oh ! I wish 

 it were summer !" Yet that very wish drives him to work 

 harder at his studies in order that when summer comes he 

 may be the better prepared for it. The summer he knows 

 goes but too quickly, and there is hardly a possibility of 

 finding time during the summer to rummage books and see 

 what one should be looking for ; those who are wise will get 

 all this book-work done beforehand, and those are wise who 

 are not given to procrastination. 



Nor let it be for a moment thought that these remarks 

 about study and making notes are addressed only to our 

 elder readers. Our own literary labours commenced before we 

 were fourteen, by the compilation (from Rennie's Conspectus) 

 of a Calendar of British Butterflies and Moths, which showed 

 under each month the species occurring in that month, whe- 

 ther they were plentiful or scarce, and in what parts of the 

 country they occurred. This list filled six copy-books, and 

 though not intended for publication, only for our own 

 private use, proved to us most serviceable j and we strongly 



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