APPENDIX. 602 
In May 1810, I received from Mr. Kirby four of his longest letters. 
There was then a pause of nearly three months ; and his next letter, 
begun May 29th, was not finished and sent off till August 15. The be- 
ginning of this last portion is given, as it will interest Entomologists, and 
as furnishing some traits of my friend of his own sketching, but very 
similar, I fancy, to what we most of us experience in similar circum- 
stances, 
“ Aug, 15, 1810.—Your reproof, my dear friend, was not unmerited ; and 
- what can I do but appeal to your good nature for forgiveness, after having 
stated circumstances which may a little extenuate, though not excuse, my in- 
dolence and procrastination ? About the middle of June, I went to Livermere, 
near Bury, to visit a friend who was formerly entomologically inclined *: he 
lives in a spot very favourable to the entomologist. Here I picked up many 
good things, particularly Neuroptera, Hymenoptera, and Diptera ; besides 
which, my friend permitted me to rummage over his collection and take what 
I liked, so that I carried home a large box full of insects. This set me, when 
returned to Barham, to looking over my collection in Orthoptera, Hemiptera, 
Neuroptera, Hymenoptera, and Diptera, a great many of which were scattered 
about in boxes, &c., and which, upon inspecting them, I found were going fast 
to ruin; and I saw it was necessary, if I meant to preserve the many good 
things I had collected, to put them in order, and in a place of security, ‘This 
has employed all my leisure hours since my return from the above visit. I 
have now nearly finished the Hymenoptera, which occasioned me infinite 
labour, and have then only the Diptera to put to rights, During this interval, 
also, my house has been full of guests, Yet with all this business Ihave been 
daily thinking of writing to you, but my employment kept seducing me ; so I 
said to myself, when I get through this genus I will write. Before your letter 
arrived, I had determined, as soon as I had done the Hymenoptera, to dis- 
charge the debt upon my conscience. It is too much my way, when I have 
begun to delay writing to any friend, to procrastinate in this way ; and when 
I engage in any pursuit, it is with ardour ; but if anything occurs to suspend 
my career, so that I lose the habit, I get a horror against it, which prevents my 
returning to it till after many efforts, —so that, as you justly say, sometimes I 
come down like a tropical torrent, and then follows a season of drought. You 
will see by this that I have not lately done much in our opus magnum. . « «+ - 
With respect to your letters, I shall answer the last first. You say your letter 
on internal anatomy oceupies fifty pages. Don’t you think you can reduce it 
to smaller compass? for it strikes me that, considering the variety of matter 
we have to handle, that, unless we attend to brevity, we shall have our work 
extend to two or three volumes.” [‘Then follow two folio pages of various 
remarks on the anatomy of insects, &c.] 
In the summer of 1812, I spent four or five months in London, occupy= 
ing the mornings chiefly in Sir Joseph Banks’s rich library, which he threw 
open so liberally and unreservedly to the researches of naturalists, in 
collecting materials for our work ; and about twe months at Barham, 
where we jointly read and corrected the Letters that were to form the 
first volume of our work. 
In the spring of 1814 I had the great delight to receive a long-pro- 
mised visit from Mr. Kirby, but which, unfortunately, the delicate state 
of Mrs. Kirby’s health obliged him to restrict to about ten days. These 
* The Rev. Peter Lathbury. 
