xlii 



Societies should make provision for the dissemination of correct 

 information respecting these insects ; and that specimens of the 

 beetles themselves should be obtained for distribution, with the 

 view of familiarizing persons with their aspect and of preventing 

 their diffusion. 



The importance of some efficient measures being adopted for 

 this purpose can hardly be overrated, in default of which this 

 scourge must assuredly be expected to follow in the wake of the 

 Phylloxera, the Oidium, and other noxious importations from the 

 same quarter. Mr. Eiley's reiterated remarks on this head have 

 a somewhat prophetic significance, when calling to mind that 

 "in giving, through Sir Walter Raleigh, the precious tuber to 

 Europe, America conferred upon the Old World an everlasting 

 boon. She may yet unwittingly be the means of bequeathing 

 as great a bane, by sending across the ocean the deadliest enemy 

 of that tuber. At all events it behoves our European neigh- 

 bours to be on the look-out, and to prevent, if possible, any such 

 catastrophe." 



The attention of the Academic des Sciences has just been 

 drawn to this subject by the French Minister for Commerce and 

 Agriculture. 



The British Bee-keeper's Association, instituted in May last, 

 " for the encouragement, improvement and advancement of Bee- 

 Culture in the United Kingdom," under the Presidency of Sir 

 John Lubbock, held its first exhibition at the Crystal Palace in 

 September last. This institution is calculated to confer im- 

 portant benefits ux^on the rural ijopulatiou by diffusing infor- 

 mation as to the most approved principles of Apiculture, in the 

 management of the hives, the collection of the produce, the 

 IJreservation of the combs, and other matters, whereby the most 

 profitable results may be obtained, thus holding out encourage- 

 ment to many who have been deterred from embarking in such a 

 lucrative enterprise by apprehensions of incompetency ; or who, 

 having done so, have not known how to turn the resources of this 

 vicarious industry to the best account. ' The British Bee Journal 

 and Bee-keeper's Adviser,' published monthly and now far ad- 

 vanced in its second volume, affords a useful medium of inter- 

 communication upon this subject. 



