2IO 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



ently two species. There was one variety, Erebia 

 tyndarus, var. bosniensis, otherwise var. balcanica, a 

 variety close to ottomanus, in which the underside 

 of the hind wing is dusted over with a beautiful 

 powdery blue, giving the insect, when flying, an 

 appearance most unlike an Erebia. There was also 

 a large Coenonympha, Colias and some Lycaenidae. I 

 found a nest of Polistes attached to a blade of grass, 

 a small conical wasps' nest, of a little more than 

 a dozen cells, attached by the base to the grass. 

 The cells were all empty. In trying to bring it 

 home, the nest dropped off, and later I found 

 myself, unfortunately, carrying an ordinary piece 

 of grass without the nest. 



One other excursion in the neighbourhood of 

 Sarajevo was to a suburb named Dolac, for which 

 one has to alight at a station on the Sarajevo-Ilidzhe 

 railway, rejoicing in the name of Alipashin Most(-). 

 Dolac is a row of low hills, just outside the town, 

 covered with grass and a few low shrubs. It was 

 an extremely disappointing day, as, excepting the 

 common Oedipoda caerulescens L., I captured nothing 

 that could not have been taken any day in the 

 summer near home. 



Sarajevo is a curious mixture of modern and old- 

 fashioned buildings, the latter, of course, being the 

 poorer quarter. The railway station is quite two 

 miles from the town itself, with which it is con- 

 nected by a fast electric tramway. The new part 

 consists chiefly of Government buildings, hotels and 

 banks, erected since the Austrians have held the 

 country in military occupation. One of the most 

 interesting buildings, after the Landesmuseum, 

 is the Handelsmuseum, where the stranger buys 

 examples of the forms of local art. The most 

 characteristic is, perhaps, inlaid work of every 

 description. Turkish carpets and hammered 

 metal, often very handsome, are also on sale. The 

 most oriental quarter of the town is the bazaar 

 where the various little shops are classified : all 

 the iron workers together, all the fruit shops 

 together, and so on with other trades. In these 

 little booths one often sees a -venerable Turk sit- 

 ting, tailor-like, with legs tucked under, smoking 

 a chibouque and sipping coffee all the afternoon, 

 whilst talking the latest scandal with his friends. 



In the Landesmuseum I only saw the insects, 

 and, judging from what Herr Apfelbeck showed 

 me, Bosnia seems to possess a very large share of 

 peculiar species of Coleoptera. In the museum they 

 have also an ethnological collection of life-sized 

 figures to illustrate the costumes of the district. 



The town is divided among four religions. 

 Nearly half are Mahommedans, while there are 

 many of the Greek, or Orthodox, Church. The 

 remainder are Roman Catholics and Jews. The 

 so-called Turks in Bosnia are, of course, rarely 

 Turks in blood. They are called " Turks " in the 

 I 2 ) This probably means " The Bridge of Ali Pasha." 



sense Mahommedan. The Bosniaques are Slavs 

 allied to the Serbians. Their language is Croatian, 

 which is merely a dialect of Serbian ( 3 ), using 

 the Latin alphabet instead of the Cyrillic. A 

 Mahommedan Slav praying to Allah, yet speaking 

 a tongue allied to Russian, seems an anomaly. 

 Notices to " beware of the train," and such like, 

 are always in four languages, German, Croatian, 

 Serbian, in Cyrillic characters, and Turkish. In 

 fact it is a most polyglot place. Strange to say, 

 there is a strong Spanish element in Sarajevo, 

 that tongue being spoken in many of the shops. 



On one occasion we went into a mosque and saw 

 the Faithful at prayer. We, being Giaours, or 

 Infidels, were permitted to go up into a gallery, to 

 watch in silence. The service was long and 

 dreary, consisting chiefly of dull chants from the 

 Quran, and repetitions. It was enlivened by a 

 dancing Dervish, a tall individual in a long white 

 cloak, worn tight as far as the waist and then loose. 

 His head-dress was a very long white fez. On two 

 occasions he twisted and twirled round in the 

 middle of the mosque for a period of about ten 

 minutes, stopping suddenly, as the chant ceased, 

 without appearing in the least giddy. After the 

 second dance, he went out. I was told that for that 

 performance he received six florins, just half-a- 

 sovereign, and if he went into a cafe the proprietor 

 was only too delighted to serve, gratis, such a holy 

 man. We came out of the mosque with the mono- 

 tonous chants still ringing in our ears, " La illah, 

 il Allah, Mahommed raz ul Allah ! " 

 (To be continued.) 



Manchester Museum Handbooks. — We have 

 received from Mr. William E. Hoyle, M.A., 

 F.R.S.E., Keeper of the Manchester Museum at 

 Owens College, a series of the useful handbooks 

 issued at that institution. They consist of |i) 

 "Catalogue of the Books and Pamphlets in the 

 Library " ; (2) "Descriptive Catalogue of Embryo- 

 logical Models"; (3) "Handy Guide to the 

 Museum"; (4) "Outline Classification of the 

 Vegetable Kingdom," by F. E. Weiss ; (5) " Out- 

 line Classification of the Animal Kingdom," by the 

 late Professor A. Milnes Marshall ; (6) " Nomen- 

 clature of the Seams of the Lancashire Lower Coal 

 Measures," by Herbert Bolton, F.R.S.E., and four 

 pamphlets of Notes from the Manchester Musuem, 

 being " Suggestions for a Proposed Natural History 

 Museum in Manchester," by the late Right Hon. 

 T.H. Huxley, LL.D..F.R.S.; "NotesonRachiopteris 

 cylindrica " Will., by Thomas Hick, B.A., B.Sc, 

 A.L.S. ; "Notes on the Ampullae in some speci- 

 mens of Millepora in the Manchester Museum," 

 by Sydney J. Hickson, M.A., D.Sc, F.R.S., 

 . " Descriptions of New Species of Brachiopoda and 

 Mollusca from the Millstone Grit and Lower Coal 

 Measures of Lancashire," by Herbert Bolton, 

 F.R.S.E. These handbooks form a series of 

 literature useful to students frequenting the 

 Museum, and even to others who have not that 

 opportunity. They vary in price from id. to is., 

 the catalogue of books being 2s. 6d. 



( 3 ) Miklosich, the great Slavonic grammarian, goes so far 

 as to consider them separate languages. 



