APHOEISMATA ENTOMOLOGICA. 15 



insects and the card braces, and I have lately had them again further 

 divided into two each, so as to have four of them one inside the other. 

 The advantage of their being narrow is that you can set the insects 

 one after the other in a row, either side ways or length ways, and you 

 thus avoid the various "moving accidents" which otherwise the setting 

 of one in the w^iy of another exposes each and all to. 



"second thoughts are best." 



All that I have said as to the desirableness and necessity of having 

 a cabinet, and that a good one, for the preservation of your specimens, 

 I still keep to; but I have since been made cognizant of another 

 kind of receptacle for them, which is equally good in most respects, 

 though not quite in all, and better in some. The Rev. William Bree, 

 of Polebrook, near Oundle, Northamptonshire, first shewed me this plan. 

 It is to have cases made, such as backgammon or chess boards, resem- 

 bling large folio books, corked and glazed inside, covered with leather, 

 and lettered on the outside, at least they may be, '^as you like it," 

 "British Entomology," "volume i.," ^'volume ii.," and so on. 



Since I saw the Rev. Mr. Bree's, I perceive that Dr. Baikie, of 

 the Naval Hospital, Haslar, has written about these blank volumes in 

 "The Naturalist," vol. ii., page 207, and, which is better, has told us 

 where they may be procured, well-made by a person in the habit of 

 making them, namely, Mr. Robert Downie, of Barnet, Hertfordshire. 

 To him I lost no time in writing for further information, and I give 

 the result to the readers of my ^'Aphorismata" — "Aphorismi," by the 

 way, my brother told me it should have been; but as he took his "First 

 Class" at Oxford in 1849, "Term: Pasch:" and I my "Second" so long 

 ago as "Term: ]Mich:" 1833; when, I may here record, I took up part 

 of "Pliny's Natural History" for the first time in that learned University, 

 to the no small astonishment and discomfiture of the Examiners ^In Literis 

 Humanioribus,' I trust my said readers will pardon me the 'lapsus,' and 

 at the same time this lengthened and somewhat involved sentence. 



But, 'ad rem :' Mr. Robert Downie furnishes me, and through me my 

 readers, with the following list of apparatus which he is always ready 

 to furnish, and which, as I truly believe they will be found good and 

 useful, as well as cheap, I heartily recommend to all who are desirous 

 of the proper preservation of their specimens. I give the whole of his 



