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THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



This he used to gratify friends, and benefit science by distributing figures of 

 unique or little known species, such as (Ecqpkora Woodiella, to all whom he 

 thought they might prove useful. As a painter on porcelain he was entitled 

 to a high place. It was a double treat to enjoy his hospitality, one the 

 bountifully supplied creature comforts so liberally supplied by his amiable 

 wife, the other the admirably depicted figures of British insects, painted by 

 himself, from specimens in his own magnificent collection, that ornamented 

 every vessel. His talent in painting was also used in his Natural History 

 diaries, which are models worth following by anyone. Thus when in his 

 Continental travels he met with a species new to him, he depicted it care- 

 fully, and accurately on the margin of his note-book, which contained a des- 

 cription and copious notes. His collections are contained in several large 

 cabinets, and are beautifully arranged. To his own collection he subsequently 

 added that of his cousin Ashworth, at the death of the latter, and when Mr. 

 R. S. Eddleston died Mr. Sidebotham purchased his collection also, and in- 

 corporated it with his own. He could thus show one of the grandest collect- 

 ions of rarieties and varieties ever seen, all purely British specimens, not a 

 single specimen in the entire collection being even of doubtful origin. His 

 drawer of Arctia caja are all extraordinary varieties, and that containing 

 Abraxas grossulariata is one of the most wonderful sights an Entomologist 

 could have, every specimen being an interesting study, the variation ranging 

 from pure white examples to many of the variety Farley ala, which are nearly 

 black. His Lithocolletidte and Nepticulce are incomparable for quantity and 

 quality, averaging thirty to fifty examples of each, the series being also illus- 

 trated by leaves of the various food plants, bearing traces of the larvee and 

 showing in what manner they had fed, thus giving the morphology of each 

 species at a glance. His cabinet contains the only British pair of BryqpMla 

 alga known. They were captured at Strines, near Manchester, by one of his 

 own workpeople. Besides all that has been named Mr. Sidebotham was a 

 good botanist. As an English gentleman he was perfect — liberal, bounteous, 

 broad in his ideas, kind and courteous to all. 



With Joseph Sidebotham dead we have lost all but the last of the old 

 band of those amateur Entomologists who held their own through good or 

 evil repute for fully half a century, and who made their mark in their day 

 and generation. J oseph Sidebotham made the world happier and wiser than 

 he found it, let those who are left try to do the same. — C.S.G. 



