78 Miscellaneous. 



The Bell Collection of Reptiles. 

 To the Editors of the Amuils and Magazine of Natural History. 



Oxford, Dec. 16, 1872. 

 GENTiEirE:!^, — With reference to the corresjjondence which has 

 appeared in the recent numbers of the ' Annals ' relative to the BeU 

 Collection of Reptiles, and with the Anew of enabhng your readers to 

 form a proper opinion upon the subject, I think it incumbent upon 

 me to state : — that the negotiation for the purchase of the entire col- 

 lection, on behalf of the Eev. F. W. Hope, was effected by myself 

 with Prof. Bell in 1S62 ; that an estimation of the extent of the 

 collection and of the value thereof was made by Mr. S. Stevens, the 

 Natural-History Agent ; that the purchase comprised 288 specimens 

 of tortoises (either entire or shells), about 40 dried snakes and 

 lizards, and 1065 reptiles of various kinds in spirits ; and that the 

 collection was immediately removed by Mr, Eowell to Oxford, where 

 it was partially arranged during the last year by Dr. Giinther, of the 

 British Museum. 



I am. Gentlemen, 



Your obedient Servant, 



J. 0. AVestwood, 



Answer to Herr Eitsema^s " Note on Crinodes Sommeri " ^-c. 

 By A. G. Butler, F.L.S. &c. 



A simultaneous attack upon a new genus, in two different maga- 

 zines, is calculated to impress one with the idea that the discoverer 

 of the supposed error must have been anxious that his acumen should 

 be widely recognized. As an answer to the entirely unwarranted 

 supposition contained in the said paragraph, I need merely inform 

 Herr liitsema of one or two facts, which, had he studied my writings, 

 he might have discovered for himself: Hiibner's 'Sammlung' has 

 been almost constantly on my table for the last seven years ; and I 

 know his figures as well as I know my own. 



I do not make a i)ractice of hunting up every conceivable resem- 

 blance in pattern between a new genus and those jireviously figured 

 in works known to me ; I content myself, at most, with a compa- 

 rison of sti-ucture between closely allied forms*. 



I did refer in my paper to the genus Dudusa (inadvertently written 

 Ditduna), a group to which C. Sommeri probably belongs f; I had 

 examined two species of this genus, and therefore could speak with 

 confidence of its relationship to Tarsal pis. 



If Hiibner was not attached to the " type system " there is no 

 reason why C. clara of Cramer should not stand as the type of the 

 genus Crino quite as much as C. Sommeri. 



* When describing Tarsclepis, I knew for certain that the structure 

 before me was entirely new. I admit that I did not remember at the time 

 that Iliibner's Crt7io Sommeri was so similar in pattern ; had I done so, 

 I might have referred to it as a moth resembling mine in pattern, although 

 clearly belonging to a different genus. 



t The females of Dudusa have a zone of spatulate scales round the tail, 

 but of only half the length of those in the males ; the antennae are mode- 

 rately pectinated, more so than in Crinodes : but there ai'e no tufts of long 

 hairs at the base of the abdomen in either sex. 



