130 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 



' Entomological News,' which is in charge of the Entomological 

 Section of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, and the 

 American Entomological Society, has just entered on the tenth year 

 of its existence. In the January number of the current volume, the 

 editor, in referring to the present status of the journal, remarks : — 

 " We are not infrequently confronted with the criticism that the 

 subject has lost its poetry and the delicate touch of nature has been 

 swept away, and, in its place, there is left a dreary list of scientific 

 names, whose meaning can only be known to a favoured few, with 

 large scientific libraries at their elbow, We try to remedy this in 

 ' The News,' but receive no help from the critics ; they talk, but do 

 not act. We admit that descriptions of new species are as dry as dust 

 under an infested specimen ; but we owe more to the systematic 

 worker than to the growler, who proclaims from the housetops what 

 should be, but has never put pen to paper." 



We can sympathize with our American contemporary, because we 

 occasionally experience the same trouble ourselves. 



Entomological magazines are the media through which all in- 

 terested in the subject may communicate whatever they have to make 

 known to the entomological public. It follows, therefore, that the 

 contents of such serials are largely regulated by contributors them- 

 selves. Editors, as a rule, can only deal with such material as is 

 voluntarily sent in for publication, or that can be obtained as a 

 personal favour from workers in special branches. The practical part 

 of entomology is perhaps most generally affected, and possibly those 

 who are interested in field work far outnumber those who prefer the 

 higher branches of the study. Consequently, it is perhaps a matter of 

 surprise that the magazines are not more frequently furnished with 

 accounts of collecting expeditions, or with communications dealing 

 with new facts in life-histories or habits of insects. Judging from 

 the exchange lists, it cannot be supposed that there is less active work 

 in the field than formerly, but it must be admitted that collectors are 

 far more reticent as regards their doings than they were. 



Among the causes that have led up to this stagnation in field 

 records, &c, the "Protection Committee," the present unsettled con- 

 dition of nomenclature, and new systems of classification have been 

 mentioned. As adverted to in a former note (ante, p. 16), the " P. C." 

 cannot be charged with muzzling the collector, and as regards the 

 other matters they have always been with us, and, so far as one can 

 see ahead, are likely to continue to perplex us for many years to come. 

 Those who undertake the task of settling, or endeavouring to settle, 

 intricate questions of synonomy, are entitled to our greatest respect, 

 even athough the result of their labour, owing to the difference 

 of opinion that obtains among synonymists as to accepting or rejecting 

 certain works of early authors, is sometimes of questionable value. 

 Systematists, too, are necessarily not quite in accord in their methods, 

 and the result is that in classification the arrangement of one author 

 is transposed by another; this has been very forcibly exemplified 

 during the last few years. All things considered, then, there is no 



