The Zoologist— July, 1866. 273 



A Glance at a few Facts connected with Alpine Entomology. 

 By Albert Muller, Esq. 



" It would be well if the collector of insects would devote at least a tiihe of his 

 energies to the speculative branch of his subject." — Wollaston, ' Variation of 

 .S/)mes, 1856, p. 113. 



Scarcely a decennium has elapsed since Mr. Wollaston enunciated 

 the above opinion, and few, if any, zoologists to whom the real advance- 

 ment of their science lies at heart, will be found who would not gladly 

 concur in the desirability of granting at least a limited sphere of 

 speculative action to fellow-labourers in their own fruitful field, espe- 

 cially when reminded of what, for instance, geologists and botanists 

 have accomplished in the same line; and if from any branch of 

 Zoology, more than from another, it is from the study of the Insecta 

 that we may confidently expect a rich harvest of facts bearing on 

 most of the important questions so eagerly discussed at the present 

 time, such as that of the Origin of Species, or, to select another, the 

 distribution of living creatures over the earth's surface. 



Various more or less plausible theories, although not yet too many, 

 relating to these questions, have successively occupied almost every- 

 body's attention, and even entomologists, than whom no other class of 

 naturalists has been slower in filling the ranks of theorists, have at last 

 been compelled to take, though grudgingly, their share in the general 

 inquiry after " more light" on the above and other subjects of minor 

 importance. But, to judge from certain criticisms lately published in 

 the 'Zoologist' (S. S. 153), entomologists as a body, especially^ 

 younger ones, seem already to have become such reckless speculators 

 with the arguments at their command, and their deductions seem to 

 be so crude and ill considered, as to merit unlimited disapprobation ; 

 at least, we are led to believe in such a state of things when we read 

 the review of the ' Coleoptera Atlantidum,' where the entomologists of 

 to-day are charged with " reaching conclusions without passing through 

 the slow process of reasoning." 



As it seems to me that this assertion does more particularly point to 

 those who dare to advance opinions, without being at the time pre- 

 pared with sufficient evidence to support them on all sides, it may not 

 be out of place to call the impartial reader's attention to what Mr. 

 Wollaston has already predicted in the work quoted above, when he 

 says, " Certain it is that much would probably be advanced, at first, 



SECOND series — VOL. I. . 2 N 



