THE NEW ENTOMOLOGY. 115 



line of thought much further might lead us to a consideration of 

 that commercial kind of Entomology which is certainly a new 

 departure, and not always a pleasing one. 



I must, however, restrict myself to my original argument, 

 and my belief is that as Entomology has enlarged her borders, 

 annexed new fields of speculation, and discovered possibilities 

 previously unthought of, so her votaries have become more 

 serious ; and if, on the one hand, we may discern a tendency for 

 the study — at any rate of the Lepidoptera — to become fashion- 

 able, and perhaps superficially popular, on the other we have as 

 adherents men eminent in biological science, men whose names 

 are familiar to you all, whose work and whose inliuence are alone 

 sufficient to redeem Entomology from the charge of triviality or 

 lack of adequate intellectual interest. 



So much for the present position of the study. And the 

 future? Well, as I said before, the time is past when the work 

 of the future was supposed to be simply the description and 

 enumeration and systematic arrangement of all the species of 

 the Order Insecta now extant on this earth ; we have other ideals. 

 In a book which has lately attracted much attention, which 

 attempts a forecast of the goal whither our present social and 

 intellectual tendencies are urging us, the author indicates his 

 belief that the future of natural science is towards specialism. 

 The possibilities of great revolutionary theories will soon be 

 exhausted ; they must be attacked and defended in detail ; the 

 sciences are yearly becoming more comprehensive and more pro- 

 found, and individual work, this author believes, must necessarily 

 become more departmental and circumscribed. And I think you 

 will consider the forecast a just one ; the tendency undoubtedly 

 is towards detail and subdivision The autocrat's " scaribee " 

 was a prototype. Eirst we had Naturalists, Kay and Linnaeus ; 

 then came Entomologists, and we still call ourselves by that 

 name, although there are really hardly any Entomologists now 

 extant, ^\e are Lepidopterists, Coleopterists, Hemipterists, and 

 the like. Already we may notice a tendency to further sub- 

 division, and probably the next century may know us as 

 " Aphodiists," '• Vanessidists," or the exhaustive investigators 

 and recorders of some extremely limited local insect fauna. I 

 fancy, too, that our studies may become more interesting as 

 they take a lateral rather than a vertical extension ; for in- 

 stance, that as facilities for exchange and intercommunication 

 become enlarged, it will be preferable to collect and study, say, 

 the Elateridse or the Theclse of the world rather than the 

 Coleoptera or Lepidoptera of Great Britain. Specialists in petto, 

 to have mastered a small part thoroughly, that will perhaps be 

 the laudable ambition of the entomologist of the future, and to 

 the vast edifice of the sum of human knowledge v;e shall be 

 content if we have added but one single and inconspicuous stone. 



