ON ORIENTAL ENTOMOLOGY... HS 
to construct suburban walks and vistas, there were actually no elm-trees in 
Spain. I must, however, remark that there is an equally singular statement 
made by Hollingshed, to the effect that in Queen Elizabeth’s time there 
were no asses in England, and that Spanish donkeys were then imported. 
Certain butterflies that appear to leap from the tree trunks to the earth and 
back again, are often noticed at the sunny leaf-strewn edges of these 
Castilian avenues. There are our own heath-frequenting Grayling and its 
congeners, Hipparchia Briseis and Statalinus. None of our commoner 
English butterflies, however, except the Meadow Browns, appear in excess 
in Castile. I noticed the Small Tortoiseshell on the nettles that fringe the 
old wall of Burgos, where a flame-coloured Cuckoo-Bee who was darting 
about had a perquisite of crannies, and near garden plots a few Cabbage 
Whites were flying. 
Rey. Dr. WaLKer.—I should like to say that I received a letter this 
morning from my friend, Mr. Frederick Pascoe, a well-known Fellow of the 
Linnean Society, who pleads a previous engagement as the reason why he 
has been prevented from attending our Meeting this evening. I may add, 
with regard to the question of using spirits as a means of keeping beetles 
and other insects, that although I should not like it to be thought it does 
the insects any harm, Mr. Pascoe says they never do so well after they 
have been kept in spirits. I am under the impression that spirits injure 
beetles much less than they do grasshoppers, and that probably spirits are 
the only handy medium to which you can consign insects in the East to 
preserve them from decay. With regard to the great Scarabzus, Mr, 
Pascoe is inclined to keep up the old name, Scarabzeus, and repudiates 
the designation ‘“ Ateuchus sacer,” which I have given it in this paper. 
The Cuairnman.—As I happen to have had some experience of life in 
the East, and particularly in Palestine. there are one or two points that 
have come under my observation on which I may be permitted to offer a 
few remarks. One has reference to the interesting subject of ants. It is 
stated in the Book of Proverbs, that they are “exceeding wise,” and “ pre- 
pare their meat in the summer.” Certain naturalists in Europe have for 
many years been in the habit of denying this statement, but within a 
recent period it has been clearly ascertained that it is actually true, and J 
am enabled to state from my own personal observation that there is no 
doubt whatever about it. In fact, it is one of the commonest things in 
country places in Palestine to see the ants busily engaged during the harvest 
season in carrying away corn, the seeds of grasses, and other things to 
their nests. They sometimes travel over great distances in order to do this, 
and nothing is more common than to see a long path, extending perhaps 
twenty, thirty, or forty yards, and more even than that, trodden down and 
worn quite bare by hundreds of thousands of ants passing to and fro 
upon it. They find out some place where wheat or barley, or some other 
grain, has fallen, or where there is a threshing-floor, and they start off in 
thousands to the spot, each ant carrying from it a seed of barley, wheat, 
grass, or whateyer it may be. Another point of great interest in connexion 
with the proceedings of these little creatures is that it is said they are some- 
times seen to bring out a store of provisions when it has been wet, in order 
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