448 COLEOPTEROUS INSECTS FOUND IN 
kept at Canaan Cottage (about half a mile from the south- 
western suburb of Edinburgh) for ten years, from January 
1821 to January 1831, is 47-25°. The instruments em- 
ployed in making the observations are 300 feet above the 
level of the high water-mark at Leith. The average of the 
minimum thermometer for ten years, is 15° ; and the ave- 
rage of the maximum thermometer for the same period, is 
79-5° ; making the average range of the thermometer du- 
ring that time 64-5°. The greatest cold which occurred 
during these ten years was in 1826, when, on the l6th of 
January, the thermometer stood at 10°. The greatest heat 
which occurred during that period was likewise observable 
in the course of the same year, the thermometer, on the 
24th and 25th days of June, standing so high as 87° in the 
shade. Thus the range of the thermometer in 1826 
amounted to 77°, which is the maximum for the time du- 
ring which the register has been kept. The average quan- 
tity of rain for one year, as deduced from registers likewise 
kept at Canaan Cottage for nine years, is 26*922 inches. 
The references to localities, it will readily be perceived, 
cannot easily be rendered precise and satisfactory. The 
haunts of such as are somewhat stationary, may be in- 
dicated with sufficient accuracy ; but many insects are of 
such wandering habits, that they may not be found twice 
in the same place. Instances of the former sort occur in 
several of the herbivorous coleoptera, which confine them- 
selves to one species of plant, and will not desert it for an- 
other even of the same natural genus. The coprophagous 
beetles, on the contrary, and those which feed on dead ani- 
mals, (denominated saprophagous by Mr Macleay) are not 
limited to a particular place, but occur wherever their food 
happens to be deposited. In such cases less advantage 
results from local references, as the appearance of an insect 
in the place cited may have been accidental, and incapable 
of affording any great probability of its recurrence ; yet 
