70 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



a paper oil " Agrotis ashworthii : Life- History up to date." In 

 addition to the general history of the life of this interesting moth he 

 gave some very interesting personal experiences of collecting and 

 breeding the insect. Mr. Tait illustrated his paper by a drawer con- 

 taining a fine series of the perfect insect showing marked variation. 

 His remarks and experiences were confirmed and amplified by 

 Messrs. W. Buckley and C. F. Johnson, who both exhibited a fine 

 series of the perfect insect.— J. F. G. Wynne, Hon. Recording Secretary. 



-OBITUARY. 



W. L. Distant. 



It is with sincere regret that we record the death, on February 

 4th, of another old and valued contributor to our pages, who had also 

 been a member of our Beference Committee since February, 1890. 

 After a long illness, due to cancer, the end came, at a nursing home 

 at Wanstead, at the age of seventy-seven years. 



Born at Botherhithe on November 12th, 1815, William Lucas 

 Distant was a son of Capt. Alexander Distant, " who, in old South- 

 Sea whaling-days, sailed round and round the world, and transmitted 

 a love of roaming to his sons." On August 5th, 1867 (which he 

 always spoke of as being the most eventful day of his life), our friend 

 himself started on a voyage to the Malay Peninsula, a voyage which 

 bore fruit in 1882-1886 in the publication of his valuable work 

 ' Bhopalocera Malayana: a Description of the Butterflies of the Malay 

 Peninsula.' 



In 1873 he married Edith Blanche de Bubien, and his family 

 consisted of five sons and three daughters. 



In June, 1890, he sailed for a " twelve months' business sojourn 

 in the Transvaal," in connection with the tanning industry, and an 

 account of his observations and experiences as a student of Nature 

 was published in 1892, under the title of ' A Naturalist in the 

 Transvaal." 



In 1897 he succeeded J. B. Harting as Editor of ' The Zoologist,' 

 and resigned the editorship at the end of 1914. 



Another visit to the Transvaal was made in 1898, and during 

 1900-1911 appeared the first volume (which had no successor) of 

 ' Insecta Transvaaliensia : A Contribution to a Knowledge of the 

 Entomology of South Africa.' 



From April, 1899, to November, 1920, he was engaged as a part- 

 time Assistant at the British Museum (Natural History), and during 

 this period of 21 h years he re-arranged the national collection of 

 Rhynchota, and described in a voluminous series of memoirs the 

 wealth of new species which he found there. His private collection 

 of about 50,000 specimens, chiefly Bhynchota, and containing alto- 

 gether over 2,500 types, came to the Museum in 1911, and th 

 purchase of it by the Trustees was completed nine years later. The 

 large and attractive insects forming the Cicadidae always remained 

 his favourite group. 



A series of family bereavements contributed largely to the break- 

 up of his health. In 1913 his second son was drowned in Australia, 

 his wife died in 1914, and in the following year his youngest son died 

 at Alexandria, while serving with the Mediterranean Expeditionary 



