358 



Wiltshire Books, Pamphlets, (end Articles. 



A Handbook of British Lepidoptera, by Edward Meyrick, B.A., 

 F.Z.S., E.E.S., Assistant Master of Marlborongh College. 

 Macnnillau & Co., London and New York. 1895. Large cr. 8vo. Cloth. 

 10*. 6d. net. 



This stout volume of 843 pp. is designed, the author tells us, to supply a 

 want created by the fact that since Stainton's Manual of British Butterflies 1 

 and Moths was published — thirty-six years ago — no really complete and 

 scientific work on the British lepidoptera has appeared. Mr. Meyrick intends 

 this work to enable any student to identify his specimens with accuracy, and « 

 also to acquire " such general knowledge of their structure and affinities as I 

 ought to be possessed by every worker before proceeding to more special 

 investigations." The book, however, is not a "popular" handbook in the 

 ordinary acceptation of the term, and, with the exception of diagrams of the I 

 venation of the wings, on which the author founds the classification of the 1 

 genera and species to a great extent, there are no illustrations. It is intended ) 

 rather to fill the kind of place in entomology that Hooker's Student's Flora I 

 fills in botany, an exact description being given of each species in strictly | 

 scientific language in the shortest possible space, together with a description of I 

 the larva, its food plants, and its geographical range in Britain and throughout 

 the world. The specific descriptions of the perfect insect have been drawn up 

 from actual specimens by the author himself, which, when one considers the 

 very large number of species of the smaller moths, must have necessitated an 

 amount of conscientious and careful work which it is difficult to overestimate. 

 But the portion of the work upon which the author himself probably sets the | 

 highest value is that dealing with the classification of genera and species, and ' 

 in this he breaks new ground and sets forth a definite system based upon thej 

 latest discoveries as to the natural affinities and apparent community of descent 

 of the various species— -the outcome of a study, as he explains, of the lepi- 

 doptera, not of Great Britain only, but of the whole world — a study which 

 enables him to give a " phylogeny " of each family that he deals with— or, in| 

 other words, a "pedigree," showing the probable relationship and course of I 

 development of the different branches of that family. It is an eminently 1 

 scientific book, the fruit not only of careful study but of a very wide knowledge j 

 indeed of the subject with which it deals — a subject on which, always supposing f 

 that the classification therein set forth is generally accepted, it will doubtless • 

 become a standard authority for the future. It will, however, come as no \ 

 small shock to collectors to find that the time-honoured classification of their j 

 cabinets is to be so ruthlessly revolutionised. The old order in entomology is 

 changing indeed, and yielding place to new, when the butterflies are to be 

 found sandwiched in among the moths after the Bomhyces, and losing all j 

 claim to be considered as distinct from moths at all ! Favourably reviewed in j 

 Guardian, March 18th ; Spectator, March 28th, 1896. 



Etchings of Marlborough College and its Surroundings, by Edward j 

 J. Burrow. Published by W. H. Beynon & Co., Cheltenham (1896). Price J 

 £1 lis. 6d. Artist's proofs, £2 2s. 



This series of etchings of the college and town will doubtless be welcomed : 



