4 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



Wherefore, in venturing on my office, I have taken 

 as my subject such things as I see and marvel at in my 

 daily life. Whether I can force their secret from them 

 I know not, bnt now and then they tell me things about 

 themselves which are certainly interesting and make me 

 marvel more. And, perchance, I may set others 

 marvelling, and the secret will be shown to them first. 

 It does not matter in what order man reaches his kingdom. 



I know that it is often a charge against those who 

 are collectors of specimens, or field-naturalists of any 

 degree, that they seek rather for rarities and rejoice rather 

 in the possession of what is rare than in what is interesting 

 and instructive. It is not a fair charge, because in 

 Biology the very fact of the rarity of a species is very sig- 

 nificant, and the species is interesting because it is rare. 

 It means that the species is in some way unfitted for con- 

 tinued existence, either through the increase of its 

 enemies or its own inherent weakness. If the last 

 British specimens of an Alpine saxifrage, whose only 

 British habitat is the extreme summit of Ben Nevis, find 

 their way into collections it is perhaps as well. But it 

 is obvious that it is the amelioration of the British climate 

 which is in reality the cause of the extinction of 8. 

 cemua, and not the collectors. Or, again, if a moth with 

 a highly specialised larva is considered a prize, it is pro- 

 bably because the species, say A. alni or D. ewphorbice* 

 is failing to maintain itself even by high specialisation. 

 Wherefore, rarefies are interesting to the Biologist, as 

 indicating changes or tendencies in the world's natural 



* Both are examples of " warning colours." Acronycta (did has 

 a caterpillar conspicuously banded black and yellow with a strong 

 pungent scent and curious hairs flattened at the tip. Deilephila 

 euphorbice is a feeder on the seaside spurges, is gorgeous red and 

 yellow, and apparently as acrid as its food plant. 



