( lv ) 
its ‘‘ birth, parentage, and education,” though journals may be 
burnt and collections dispersed. 
I can readily understand that the objection may be started 
that if this written label be placed under the insect with the ~ 
writing downwards, it is necessary to take up every individual 
specimen in order to read the contents of the labels, and that if 
the label be placed under the insect with the writing upwards, 
the information will be even more effectually hidden from sight. 
Perhaps some day the progress of civilisation will enable us 
to get over this difficulty, by the general adoption of long pins 
for the insects in our collections. Specimens on long pins are 
far safer from the attacks of mites and other pests, and ample 
space is also given for the display of instructive labels, giving all 
needful information about the individual specimens. 
But even pending the adoption of the long pins, which to the 
truly conservative entomological mind must appear a far more 
revolutionary proposal than the extension of household suffrage 
to the counties, I think it is possible to get over the difficulty of 
making the labels readily visible, by mounting the insects on 
artichoke pith. 
The pith of the Jerusalem artichoke is admirably adapted for 
this purpose; our German friends, who first started the notion 
of mounting their Micro-Lepidoptera on pith, began by using the 
pith of the elder, but that, even if white at first, is apt to be dis- 
coloured by age, whilst the pith of the Jerusalem artichoke 
retains its beautiful whiteness. 
The annual stems of the artichoke are otherwise useless, and 
are cut down and thrown away, or burnt at the approach of 
winter, but to the entomologist they have a special value, from 
containing such a bounteous supply of this useful pith. When I 
first wanted to use this pith, I thought that I should find that 
some one had had the idea of preparing such a product for sale, 
but I found on inquiry that the habit of each entomologist was 
to prepare his own pith, and after a certain amount of bungling, 
I contrived to get into the way of doing so for myself. ‘The best 
instruction I got was from Herr Hartmann, of Munich, who 
assured me that the main thing was to have a very sharp pen- 
knife, with which to cut the pith. 
Now just conceive the difference in the amount of information 
afforded by two drawers of insects, in one of which each specimen 
