76 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



finality in nomenclature, strict priority, without any qualification 

 whatever, must prevail. There can be no question that the only 

 method of securing even approximate stability is to ascertain with 

 certainty not only the earliest legitimate names of species, but the 

 true generic position of species in classification. Thanks to the 

 untiring investigations of many able specialists, the time is 

 probably not very far distant when we may be able to feel con- 

 fident that, in the majority of cases at least, the last word has 

 been written or said on both these important points, and that 

 rock-bottom in such matters has been reached. 



BY THE WAY. 



" Hengistbury Head, as I have known it and cared for it, is 

 at an end. . . . Hengistbury Head and the bit of wild and wet 

 ground between the estuary of the river and the strange bastions 

 and embankments of the great mass on the land side have been 

 sold. ... It is to be developed and improved. I foresee a row 

 of new bungalows ... a golf links . . . the Head itself crowned 

 by a great hotel . . . Hengistbury will so soon be harnessed to 

 civilization that the wild life of it is no more a thing to be 

 secretive about. Its Natural History period is over . . . There 

 is no other spot from the Old Harry Kocks to Hayling so alluring 

 to those who value wild life in a wild scene as the great * ham ' 

 immediately under the headland, and the flats and swamps 

 there — the tract that belongs half to the land and half to the 

 water." " I have never been to this place without seeing some- 

 thing worth remembering," says Mr. George Dewar in the 

 'Morning Post,' on the 6th ult., nor have we; and we shall 

 deplore its loss to us, " when the new age begins there this year 

 or next." All the Christchurch records of the fine maritime 

 earwig, Labidura riparia, come from the base of this bluff, where 

 we passed a lovely afternoon last June. Latterly it seems to 

 occur in greater numbers further west. 



The social supper given by " The President of the Entomo- 

 logical Society and other entomologists," at the Holborn 

 Eestaurant on the 16th, was a brilliant success. The one point 

 to be aimed at was to perpetuate the delightful annual gatherings 

 of entomologists of every class, exactly on the lines adopted for 

 nearly thirty years by Mr. G. H. Verrall ; whether this were 

 achieved by a single individual, by a few persons inviting the 

 rest, or by ticket, was entirely immaterial, and the middle course 

 has been adopted for the first year. The accident of Mr. Morice 

 taking the chair forms no precedent for future Presidents of the 

 Society, with which and the Entomological Club the present 

 arrangement has no official connection. 



