Bairstow : Nattteal History Notes— South Africa. 169 



gone far in proclaiming my own impoverishment. As Miss E. A. 

 Ormerod very tersely puts it (and especially is this desirable in our 

 Colonies), " the chief thing seems to me, to have a centre that cares for 

 the surroundings." Mr, Trimen, therefore, I regard as the centre of 

 butterfly lore, not self-constituted, but acknowledged as the leading 

 spirit by all. Considering general beauty, specific variation, diversity 

 of form, and structural attractiveness of our insects, taken in order of 

 merits, or merits of order, my first impressions give precedence 

 respectively as follows : — 



Coleoptera. 

 Hymenoptera — Diptera. 

 Orthoptera. 

 Lepidoptera. 

 Hemiptera. 

 Arachnida. 

 Neuroptera. 



A general survey — casual or concise — from visitor or native, results in 

 confirming the appointment of Coleoptera to the first place of honour. 

 Aggregating all the species which occur in the eastern districts alone, 

 from Cape Agulhas to Durban, it might be possible to under-compute 

 the whole at a quarter of a million. I do not doubt a collector working 

 regularly year by year, would add daily to his list of species. Is it 

 not, therefore, singular and lamentable that home entomologists — 

 whose advantages are so pronounced — spend their time almost 

 exclusively in the treatment and study of threadbare subjects, Avhilst 

 thousands of foreign species remain un worked, unknown, and when 

 willing hands of willing entomologists droop from sheer destitution, 

 in absence of material aid, and mutual intercourse. Specialists do 

 certainly serve their day and generation, but generalists must take the 

 lead. In a country like South Africa, conforming to an order or a 

 genus means snatching at gold when diamonds surround —another term 

 for heartache. Heaping up collections is a secondary affair. Walking 

 out of darkness into light precedes. 



I may not bid adieu to the dear old Coleos until I have mentioned 

 an >early impression relating to protective instinct, or protective 

 provisions. Beetles exist capable of ejecting an acidulous secretion as 

 an obstacle to, or a means of, ejectment from depredatory enemies. 

 Antliia \^-(jidtata belorgs to these blockaders, and directs its formic 

 acid battery with tolerable success, forcible enough to cover long- 

 distances. Occasionally when my foot has been deposited gently upon 

 an enraged captive, the liquid has actually reached my eyes, causing 



