32 



THE BRITISH NATURALIST. [February 



Review. 



GUERNSEY SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE 

 AND LOCAL RESEARCH. 



Two volumes of the Report and Transactions of this Society have 

 reached us, the first including the period from the establishment of the 

 • Society in 1882 to the year 1888, the second, the year i88g only. They 

 shew that the Society, though only numbering 37 members, is doing 

 more useful work than many another with much larger membership 

 and wader sphere of action. By the rules, the objects of the Society 

 are declared to be : — " To give mutual aid in the study of the various 

 branches of Natural Science," and " the drawing up of correct lists of 

 the various animals, plants, and minerals, indigenous to Guernsey." 

 These are very ordinary rules ; but it is to the manner in which the 

 members interpret the last rule to which we would draw attention, and 

 commend the attention of other Societies. They take nothing for 

 granted. Every record must be verified before they allow it to pass 

 as correct. Not that they overlook or ignore old records. They are 

 all noted as matters requiring verification, as work for the members to 

 accomplish. Lists prepared in this careful way are always satisfactory, 

 and tlie Society is doing honest, good work. Another point to which 

 attention should be given is the refusal of the members to divulge 

 localities, at the risk of the species being eradicated. I quote a 

 passage from " The Ferns of Guernsey,"' in the first Volume, relating 

 to the discovery in that island of the "Jersey Fern" (Gymnospgramiua 

 leptophila J Forthwith I was waited upon by -half-a-dozen indi- 

 viduals, all anxious to commence the work of extermination ; a carriage 

 was at my service ; w^ould I be kind enough to come and point out 

 the spot where it was to be found ? 1 was hard-hearted enough to 

 refuse, and to keep my own counsel." The more important papers 

 published are the Butterflies and the Nocturnal Macro Lepidoptera, 

 the Ferns, the Flowering Plants, and several on the Marine Zoology 

 and the Geology of Guernsey and the neighbouring islands of Sark, 

 Henn, ^uid Lihou. The Society possesses an excellent museum, the 

 contents of which arc almost exclusively confined to the local fauna. 



