156 



Insects. 



I stake what little honour and credit I have hitherto gained with the 

 public, on the correctness of it. 



Should the reader believe me on my word, and then compare my ac- 

 count of the cayman with that which Swainson wrote for Lardner, he 

 must evidently come to the following conclusion, viz. — that Swain- 

 son, when he wrote his account of this reptile, was either totally unac- 

 quainted with its habits and economy, or that he wilfully perverted 

 them, and made out the cayman to be a slow-paced and even timid 

 animal, in order to be revenged on me, who had described it as swift, 

 and one of extraordinary ferocity : for, be it known, that in 1837, I 

 found myself under the necessity of writing to Swainson, a very pun- 

 gent ornithological letter, which was printed. He never answered 

 this letter, and I thought that I had done with him altogether, till in 

 1839, whilst I was in Italy, out came Lardner's volume on Fishes, 

 containing the sweeping extract which T have transcribed at the 

 head of this paper. Swainson was then about to take his final de- 

 parture to New Zealand. 



Steam will soon convey to him a copy of this. I call upon him to 

 contradict the statements which it contains, — or to acknowledge the 

 truth and the propriety of them. Charles Waterton. 



Walton Hall, March 4, 1843. 



Enquiry respecting the admission of Critical Papers into ' The 

 Zoologist.^ I am anxious to know whether, in ' The Zoologist,' you 

 intend to admit communications of a general critical nature, on ar- 

 rangements, natural systems, &c., which your correspondent thinks 

 would materially advance the increasing importance of your periodical. 

 — Henry Walter Bates ; Queen St., Leicester, March 1, 1843. 



[We shall be obliged for the opinions of our readers on this subject : we have no 

 wish to gratify, in any branch of our editorial labours, beyond the very reasonable one 

 of pleasing them. — EcL'] 



Note on the capture of Vanessa Antiopa near Truro. Between the 

 1st and 4th of June, 1832, I took a weather-beaten specimen of Va- 

 nessa Antiopa in the woods of IVegethnan, the seat of the Earl of Fal- 

 mouth, near Truro ; but from the clay-coloured borders of the wings, 

 and the extremely shattered state of the insect, I strongly suspect it 

 to have been a French specimen, driven by the wind across the chan- 

 nel. I have been informed that in the Pyrenees the species is double- 



