Ixviii 



fear, adequately perform its functions with so limited a number 

 of members, unsupported by other aid than that supplied by our 

 moderate subscription. The cost of comfortable West-end 

 lodgings, with capacious room for meetings, and the maintenance 

 of a library, leave a wholly insufficient balance out of an income 

 of £300 a year to spend on publications, which I ventm"e to think 

 are by far the most important part of the work of such a Society as 

 om-s. So well is this latter fact understood in Germany, that the 

 Entomological Societies there set forth the publication of papers 

 as their leading object and, acting up to this, they publish 

 volumes, of very respectable bulk, wdiich are given in retm'n for 

 subscriptions less than one-half (in the case of om* town members, 

 one-thuxl) of ours. I allude especially to the Societies of Stettin 

 and Berlin, the former of which possesses more than six hundred 

 members and the latter about three hundred and fifty. In the 

 French Society the subscription is nearly as high as ours, and the 

 permanently large numbers is probably due to the high estimation 

 in which its Anjiales are held, for the quantity, excellence, and 

 particularly for the variety of their contents. It is the same cause 

 which attracts so many members to the German Societies just 

 mentioned, namely the satisfactory quid pro quo which is returned 

 for the subscription. I know it is difficult to effect reforms in matters 

 such as these. There is perhaps only one alteration that could 

 bring about a more satisfactory state of things with us, and that is 

 the introduction into our ' Transactions ' of a greater variety of 

 subjects ; such as would be likely to attract to om* fold the 

 notoriously large number of Entomologists in the United Kingdom 

 who hold aloof from us. We want, besides the excellent papers 

 descriptive of new exotic species which have too exclusively filled 

 our pages, records of observations on the habits, life-histories, 

 and geographical distribution of insects ; on local variation, its 

 causes and results ; narratives of Entomological excm'sions and 

 captures ; observations on structure, functions and instinct ; 

 relations of insects to flowers ; and in short, on all such subjects 

 as are interesting to the greater number, as distinguished from 

 descriptive papers which are interesting only to the lesser 

 number. In saying this, I am fully aware of the difficulties that 

 lie in the way of obtaining these good things. Our Secretaries 

 and Council would be very glad to get fairly well-written and 

 original papers on any of these subjects, but they do not come. 



