I 1 2 
NATURE NOTES. 
is at once manifest in his plumage and song. On the other 
hand many people ruin their canaries by an amiable desire for 
their comfort, but not “ according to knowledge.” I was once 
consulted about a sick bird, wheezy, languid and heavy looking, 
his breast bare and inflamed, his plumage dank and without 
gloss. On inquiring into his diet I found that he had been 
taught to acquire a taste for roast mutton and suet pudding ! 
I also on one occasion rescued Frenchman Johnnie, just in 
time, from the hands of a well-meaning friend, who had under- 
taken to guard him for a month in the absence of his family. 
She kept him in a ver}" hot room for fear of his catching cold, 
in July; pulled the blinds down because she did not like a 
strong light, and attributed the same taste to him ; and fed him 
largely on maw seed, because he seemed to like it ! An open 
window, green stuff galore, and a taste of castor-oil brought him 
round, but it was a narrow squeak for his life. Truly, the 
tender mercies of the ignorant are no improvement, in practice, 
on those of the wicked, however much they differ in intention. 
Henrietta E. Walton. 
TWO BUTTERFLY BOOKS.- 
In the old “Jatdine’s Naturalists’ Library,” the forerunner of the present 
series, a volume was devoted to British and another to foreign butterflies. Mr. 
Kirby, to whom the entomological part of the new “ Naturalists’ Library ” has 
been entrusted, has wisely shrunk from adding another to the portentous list of 
works on British Butterflies alone, and in the volume before us we have the 
first part of an attempt “ to make the British Butterflies illustrate and lead up to 
a study of the Butterflies of the World.” The result is an extremely handy little 
treatise, which certainly, as writers of school-books are wont to remark in their 
prefaces, “supplies a want.” As the author tells us in his preface, “ the present 
volume is devoted to the great family Nymphalidie, which, with its sub-divisions, 
includes about half the known butterflies ; ” the next volume “ will contain the 
remaining families, and will thus complete the subject, so far as the butterflies 
are concerned.” 
In the introduction we have a general account of the external structure of 
lepidopterous insects, especially butterflies, in their various stages. Several 
pages are devoted to collecting, and there is a useful section on geographical dis- 
tribution, while we are especially pleased to welcome a translation by the author 
of a most interesting account by M. C. Piepers of the habits of butterflies and 
moths in the Dutch East Indies. In his remarks on the pupa, Mr. Kirby might 
have mentioned the researches of Jackson and Poulton, which show how the 
sexes can be distinguished in this stage ; while, moreover, we are told nothing 
about the interesting subject of venation until the wings are found in the perfect 
* A Handbook to the Order Lepidoptera (Allen’s Naturalists’ Library) ; by 
W. F. Kirby, F.L.S., &c., &c. Part I. Butterflies, vol. i., 8vo, pp. Ixxiv. and 
261, with 37 plates. London: W. II. Allen & Co., 1894, price 6s. 
Biitterjlies and Moths {British) ; by W. Furneaux, F. R.G.S. With 12 
coloured plates and numerous illustrations in the text, 8vo, pp. xiv. and 358. 
London : Longmans, Green & Co., 1894, price los. 6d. net. 
