Natural-History Collectors. 5559 



the next. I have had three months' excellent collecting : to give you 

 an idea of the quality, there are five species of Prionidae new to me, 

 and I think four new to Science. I saw M. De Gand : he spent two 

 months at Tabatinga, and then descended to Para, and I have heard 

 nothing more of him ; he complained much of his sufferings : it is a 

 terrible hard country up river ; he complained of scarcity of insects, — 

 showed me all his captures ; some dozen good things new to me, 

 viz. a Cicindela (fine), a Pelidnota, a Macraspis, a Batonota, some fine 

 Erotyle, &c. Mr. Hauxwell has been with me again ; I think he will 

 do nothing more in birds, which is a pity, as no one has the tact with 

 Indians that he has ; he could get several faithful hunters, whilst none 

 of the rest of us can get one, and in birds little can be done without 

 them : the bad price given for his fine collection of river Ucayali is 

 the cause. 



" H. W. Bates." 



Mr. Alfred R. Wallace. — "Macassar, September 27, 1856. At 

 length I am in Celebes ! I have been here about three weeks, and as 

 yet have not done much, except explored the nakedness of the land, — 

 and it is indeed naked, — I have never seen a more uninteresting 

 country than the neighbourhood of Macassar : for miles around there 

 is nothing but flat land, which, for half the year, is covered with water, 

 and the other half is an expanse of baked mud (its present state), with 

 scarcely an apology for vegetation ; scattered about it are numerous 

 villages, which, from their being imbedded in fruit trees, have the ap- 

 pearance of woods and forests, but which, in fact, are little more pro- 

 ductive to the insect collector than the paddy-fields themselves. 

 Insects, in fact, in all this district there are absolutely none. I have 

 got a bamboo-house near one of these villages, about two miles from 

 the town, which does very well for my head-quarters : to get into the 

 country is difficult, as it belongs to native princes, and there is' no 

 accommodation whatever for Europeans : there is, however, a patch 

 or two of forest about six or eight miles off, and to it 1 have made 

 several excursions, and got some birds and butterflies, but no beetles, 

 which, at this season, seem altogether absent. I cannot help com- 

 paring the facilities of the collector on the Amazon with the difficulties 

 here : whether at Para, Santarera, Barra, Obidos or Ega, or any other 

 town or village, you may always find good forest collecting-ground 

 within a few minutes' or half-an-hour's walk of the place, — you can 

 live in the town, and collect in the country round. In no place in the 

 East that I have yet seen can this be done : miles of cultivated ground 

 absolutely barren for the naturalist extend round every town and 



