SELBORNIANA. 
239 
the life histories are better studied, but I am afraid only too often with the 
view of getting a perfect specimen of the imago for the cabinet. The cabinet 
is an excellent place for referring to a preserved specimen at a time when that 
identical species is in another state ; but the desire of the lover of nature has 
got beyond the museum stage, and the want is to see and study the living 
animal or plant in as wild a condition as possible. By placing the enclosure 
or “ sanctuary ” on the border of a large tract of open country, many of the 
insects reared in safety within might form fresh colonies in the open, and 
become common where they are now scarce. Of course I need hardly add 
that no insect, however beautiful, if injurious to other interests, should be 
introduced. It happens, however, that the greater number of our most beautiful 
forms are perfectly harmless ; the lepidoptera feeding upon wayside weeds ; 
the odonata (dragon flies) upon small troublesome flies and their larvae ; the 
trichoptera (caddis flies) upon aquatic plants and insects. In the coleoptera 
most of the “ladybirds” feed upon aphides; in the hymenoptera the bees 
feed upon the flowers ; and some of our most handsome diptera are parasitic 
upon the wild bees. Such a work as I have suggested is certainly one which 
should commend itself to every Selbornian, and one which a Society such 
as ours might take up. 
R. Marshmax Wattsox. 
A Bad Example (p. 217). — Under this heading you allude regretfully to 
the catching of sixty swallowtails by three schoolboys, and I fully concur in your 
remarks. Since my schooldays I have ceased to be an entomologist, but my 
pursuit as a landscape painter naturally takes me to the haunts of butterflies, and 
I have noticed of late years a decided diminution in the quantity of several species 
with which I was formerly familiar, and notably the beautiful insect in question. 
Some years ago it was suggested that it might be possible to acclimatise some 
exotic species, a proposal to which I ventured to raise the objection that, from a 
scientific point of view, it would not be desirable to change the habitats of the 
fauna and flora of different countries. Whilst still entertaining this opinion it 
occurs to me that as some of our rarer lepidoptera are common on the Continent 
of Europe, and even in the north of France, it would not be difficult to transport 
the eggs or the larvae into this country so as to replenish the remaining stock 
before they become extinct. 
Among the species that occur to me I may mention the swallowtail, including 
the other species of Papilio, now exceedingly rare in this country — known in I' ranee 
under the name of “laflamme,” — the Camberwell Beauty, the Purple Emperor 
and the Apollo. As these may still be strictly regarded as British insects, there 
would be no difficulty in finding appropriate food for the larvte. Our insular 
position is doubtless the main cause of the partial extinction of many species 
which, from their exceptional beauty, it would be desirable to recover. 
Frank Dillon. 
The Daily Chronicle of November 6 thus endorses our remarks The 
wanton and indiscriminate slaughter by three schoolboys, with whom a writer in 
the current number of Nature Notes claims friendship, of no fewer than sixty 
specimens of the swallowtail butterfly, will be viewed with indignation by all true 
Selbornians. Although bred in captivity in considerable numbers, this magnifi- 
cent insect, like the Camberwell Beauty, which no longer luxuriates amongst the 
willows of Camberwell, is every year becoming more and more local in its 
appearances, the fen districts in the eastern counties, and occasionally the Norfolk 
Broads, being among its few remaining haunts. Well does the Editor of the 
Selborne Society’s Magazine protest against the way in which our rare insects — 
and may we add birds also to meet the demands of fashion — are being gradually 
exterminated. 
A Question of Spelling. — In his appreciative notice of A Garden of 
Pleastire (p. 214) has the Editor quite sufficiently considered the ways of the 
“printer’s devil,” or allowed for his sins ? “ Serastium ” nor “sysirhinchium,” 
were surely never writ by me ! and had they been so written, words so 
uncouth would never have been tolerated by The Gardeners' Chronicle, in whose 
pages the chapter first appeared. As for “ saudades,” it is Portuguese for that 
dark puce-coloured garden scabious, commonly known here as ladies’ pincushion. 
