( lxxviii ) 



the distribution of species throughout our islands, or the 

 extent of their variation therein ; and we cannot yet answer 

 satisfactorily so elementary a question as to whether there 

 are any species actually confined to their limits. A vast 

 amount of enthusiasm and skill have in the last hundred 

 years been devoted to the formation of collections of the 

 insects of Britain and Europe, and I think the results are 

 certainly not adequate to the efforts that have been made. 

 The reasons for this are not difficult to find. Imperfect 

 modes of preparation and preservation have much to do with 

 it ; and then each collector forms his collection for himself, 

 and does it so that as his knowledge of it dies with him, the 

 collection loses a large part of its value at his decease. 



Bad collecting, so that the insects are in a deteriorated 

 condition before being pinned ; then deterioration resulting 

 from the pins, the ravages arising from mites, mould, dust, 

 and careless handling, so deteriorate an ordinary collection 

 that at the close of a life-time the specimens are worth but 

 little, and if there is no locality or date or other particulars 

 attached to each specimen, the collection becomes of no 

 general value whatever. 



Isolated and imperfectly directed efforts are the chief 

 reasons why there are no first-rate collections of British 

 insects. This is a matter of importance, because after all, 

 even in our own time and country, the collecting power in 

 the community is but small, and it must be well directed if 

 the maximum of result is expected from it. 



You will have perceived from my remarks to-night that I 

 attach much importance and value to collections. There are 

 some who take a different view, and, perceiving that the 

 ultimate object of collections is the information that can be 

 obtained from them, say that attention is so much taken up 

 by the formation of the collections that it is actually diverted 

 from the questions the collections are formed to elucidate. 

 There is, no doubt, truth in this view, but it is equally true 

 that the larger questions of science can be answered only by 

 the combined efforts of a number of generations ; and, this 

 being the case, each generation should accomplish that part 

 of the work that is most needful at the moment, and at the 

 present time, in consequence of the extension of the 



