The Presidents Address. 



121 



treatise, embodying at their proper places the thousands of independent 

 notices scattered through a crowd of transactions and periodicals — dispos- 

 ing of questions of disputed synonymy — deciding the great questions of 

 disputed arrangement, and where these appear wrong correcting them, 

 or offering a new solution of the difficulty, — is a task requiring the pa- 

 tience of Sisyphus and the powers of labour of Hercules, combined with 

 talents, attainments, and facilities possessed by very few. Such is the 

 task which is now being successfully carried out by Professor Lacordaire. 

 Five volumes have already appeared : the first is occupied with the 

 Cardbidce ; the second, the Staphyliniclce and Clavicornes ; the third, 

 the Lamellicornes ; the fourth, the Buprestidce, Elateridce, and Malaco- 

 dermata; and the fifth, with the Heteromera. The manner in which 

 a systematic view of the subject is given is this : — The characters of 

 the different groups, larger and smaller, are separately detailed ; a 

 full exposition of the characters of each genus, with its synonymy, 

 is then separately given; a notice of its geographical distribution, 

 or any specialty relating to it, is added ; and in a note, a list of all the 

 species hitherto described is given in the shortest space possible, with 

 occasional synonymical corrections. A beautiful atlas or volume of plates, 

 giving figures and details of the rarer genera, is to accompany the work ; 

 and here, as*in the text, every care is taken to save unnecessary expense. 

 In the lists of the species given in the notes, for instance, instead of bur- 

 dening them with the species which have been described in the chief 

 monographs on the subject, Professor Lacordaire assumes that these are 

 already in the library of every entomologist, and merely says, 11 To the 

 150 species (or whatever the number may be) described by Dejean, add 

 the following." So in the plates, nothing that is to be found in works 

 easily accessible is here repeated. This has been carried so far as even 

 to assume the aspect of a defect — at least I am sure that the majority of 

 purchasers would gladly have paid a little more for a larger series of 

 figures of rare genera than has yet been given. The result of Professor 

 Lacordaire's labours, however, is that this is undoubtedly the most useful 

 entomological work of the present day. It is a perfect storehouse of 

 information, and forms a new starting-point from which entomologists 

 may take a fresh departure. In according to it so much commendation, 

 I am far from implying that it is perfect, or implicitly to be trusted to. 

 It is esc necessitate in great part a compilation, and, as in all compila- 

 tions, the accuracy of the work depends upon the accuracy of the original 

 describer, not of the compiler. 



Next in importance to this work of Professor Lacordaire we have a 

 number of very valuable monographs. The concurrent opinion of ento- 

 mologists has been of late years expressed so strongly against the prac- 

 tice, once common, of giving isolated specific descriptions of individual 

 insects in transactions or periodicals, that such descriptions are now be- 

 coming proscribed, unless where some special reason exists for signalizing 

 an individual — as, for instance, its being of a very anomalous character, 

 so that its true position may be matter of doubt, or its supplying a vacant 

 gap, or furnishing an interesting unknown representative in one country 

 of a group peculiar to another country. Except under such circum- 

 stances, one does not now often meet those isolated descriptions with which 

 the young beginner used to essay his flight. Something connected is 

 now looked for, and entomological writings either assume the form of 

 monographs or local faunas. I shall first glance at the recent monographs. 

 One very important one is a monograph of the Elateridce by M, Candeze 

 of Liege (a pupil of M. Lacordaire), which has been executed with a care 

 and skill worthy of his great master. M. l'Abbe de Marseuil's mono- 

 graph of the Histeridce, lately published in the Annates of the Entomo- 



