14 
His observations and his photographs were no less interesting 
among the insects. He hada series showing the evolution of a 
pupa into a peaceck butterfly,—the emerging of the butterfly, its 
drying of its wings, its preliminary trials of those wings before 
launching out on the new aérial life. Astonished once to see a 
bee, gathering honey on the bee-orchis, recoil as if struck by a 
deadly wound, he examined the orchis, and found that what 
appeared new buds were really spiders, lying in wait for bees and 
relying on their resemblance to the flower. Later in the season, 
as the bees sought other plants, the spiders followed. Deprived 
now of the aid of mimicry, the spider used its arts dodging 
about the flower, playing at hide-and-seek with the bee, until it 
got into a favourable position to leap out from its hiding-place 
and strike. Mr. Duncan had even photographs of the ferocious 
larvee of the dragon-fly and water-beetle fighting. Enlarged on 
the screen, these fantastic creatures looked like nothing so much 
as some of the scaly dragons painted on the walls of the Pavilion 
meeting in pitched battle. 
These photographs, it appeared, were all obtained in the New 
Forest, where Mr. Duncan had spent many months stalking his 
birds and insects. Among many adventures was one that landed 
him up to the armpits in a bog, from which he was an hour in 
extricating himself. Naturally Mr. Duncan had many interesting 
things to say about the people who live in the Forest and their 
customs, which include many survivals of Saxon times. 
Further, he had many photographs of purely pictorial interest, 
and these were of great artistic beauty. 
An important warning issued by Mr. Duncan deserves the 
widest publicity. What with professional collectors and the 
mania of the modern teacher for sending children into the 
country to collect flowers, eggs, and everything else, many of our 
species of wild birds and wild flowers are now within measurable 
distance of extinction. At the beginning of this year he noted 
twenty-four different nests for making observations upon. When 
the time came for those observations, he found that collectors 
had taken every egg from every nest. He pleaded for some law 
to stop these depredations. Mr. Duncan mentioned other facts 
which went to show what grave mistakes are made by men when 
they destroy the balance of nature by exterminating some species 
in fancied self-interest. The people in the New Forest 
complained that the deer did damage to their pasturage, and an 
order was issued to exterminate the deer. Now they have not 
half the pasturage they used to have, and the amount is growing 
less and less. Gorse is encroaching on every side from lack of 
the deer to eat the young growths and so keep it within bounds, 
