94 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



£16 ! — entirely because there was no opposition. The copy, which 

 once belonged to Dr. P. B. Mason, is not likely to be resold at under 

 £60, and but for the fact that one cannot very well acquire duplicate 

 copies of these beautiful but expensive books, the writer would have 

 felt inclined to give the purchaser a run for his money. Hubner's 

 ' Larvae,' an imperfect copy, realised £9, and his ' Exotic Butterflies,' 

 the modern " Wytsman " edition, £11. The other great German 

 work, Herrich Schaffer's ' Bearb. Schmett.,' had a better fate, and 

 went to adorn the library of one of our best-known lepidopterists, 

 the price paid was £42. Even this, however,' was very considerably 

 less than the last copy brought to auction realised, and which was 

 acquired by the writer at Godman's. sale. The book is valued in 

 Quaritch's Catalogue at £63. Another ridiculous price was Boesel's 

 beautiful ' Insecten Belustigungen,' which actually changed hands for 

 £4. What are so many of our wealthy Lepidopterists thinking of ? 

 They pay £20 or £30 for a variety of a butterfly that has not even the 

 merit of being unique, and is much more abundantly met with in 

 Continental Europe than with us, and yet they allow these most 

 beautiful and interesting old books, which are the vital literature of 

 their science, to pass to the dealers for one-fourth of their current 

 value without making an effort to secure them ! There is no 

 doubt but that these books will greatly enhance in price in the 

 not far distant future, as culture becomes more general, and they 

 get scarcer. It must be borne in mind that they were only 

 issued in very small editions. Take Hubner's ' Sammlung,' for 

 instance : in my copy the number of subscribers is given as sixty- 

 nine, and although it is believed others were afterwards added, the 

 total number is not likely to have exceeded 100. We have in Britain, 

 so far as I know, about a dozen copies, of which the majority 

 are in libraries, and the book is much scarcer abroad than with us. 

 It seems pretty certain that in a few years the four or five copies still 

 in private hands will be absorbed into public institutions or sold to 

 Americans. One would think that even to the variety collector such 

 books would appeal, for apart from their merit as representatives of 

 an age that justly prided itself on the exquisite quality and conscien- 

 tiousness of its work, which will never be reproduced or equalled, the 

 figures are quoted extensively in all the literature of our science, and 

 therefore, if the subject is to be understood, copies must be held for 

 reference. Of course they cannot be borrowed ; no library possessing 

 a copy will loan it out on any consideration. Cramer and Stoll, 

 ' Papillons Exotique,' realised £10 10s., and the beautiful ' Lepidoptero- 

 logie Comparee' of Oberthur £43. ' Genera Insectorum ' reached £20, 

 and Seitz's ' Pal. Lep.' £4 6s. A remarkable purchase was that of 

 Culot's ' Noct. et Geom. d'Europe,' only just completed. The exquisite 

 figures — thousands of them — are hand-coloured by the premier ento- 

 mological artist of the day, and the cost of the work to subscribers has 

 been about £20. It was bought for £7 ! Another remarkable bargain 

 was Godart et Duponchel's ' Hist. Nat. de Lep. de France,' usually 

 listed at about £25. The price on Wednesday last was £4 ! Snellen 

 (Sepp) ' Nederland Insekten,' four volumes, complete, was acquired 

 by the writer for ,£6. Trimen's ' South African Butterflies ' sold 

 for £3, and Hewitson's beautiful ' Lycoenida? ' for £3 10s. only ! Of 



