: 
THE ENTOMOLOGIST’S 
WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER. 
No. 231.] SATURDAY, MARCH 9, 1861. [Price Id. 
“I, FIB ST.” 
Nemo’s letter, which appeared in the 
same number of the journal, was as 
follows : — 
“ I confess, when I read the note 
signed ‘Scriptor’ in your journal last 
month, I was surprised that you should 
have soiled your pages by inserting 
such nonsense. I felt confident, from 
the style of the writer, that ‘Scriptor’ 
must be a complete ignoramus, and so 
it proves; the insect he so confidently 
announces as Ootes bradgpus is not 
even an Ootes at all. I called on 
him, and saw his collection, in which 
were specimens ill skewered, ill set, 
ill arranged and wrongly named ; he 
showed me the ‘ earliest capture,’ which 
I ‘ dates twenty years back,’ and lo ! it 
j was an Ilcsometa, of which the antennae 
had been broken off close to the basal 
joint! After this your readers may 
judge of the scientific value of the 
‘elaborate paper, read before the Natu- 
ral History Society of Flummery-cum- 
Dumdum,’ in which he ‘pointed out 
the distinction between it and all the 
other allied species of the genus.’ If 
the ‘Transactions’ of that Society are 
filled with papers of equal value they 
must he of rare merit! It is utterly 
inconceivable lo me that any one, with 
such a masterly monograph as that 
of Schwalben’s before him, could be 
guilty of such au eccentric absurdity. 
I presume we must set it down to 
the eccentricities of genius ! As to 
Scriptor’s absurd idea that I had over- 
looked his paper, I knew it well, but 
it did not require a glance at his col- 
lection to enable me to determine that 
his insect was no Ootes. That much 
at any rate was patent from his 
‘ elaborate paper,’ and I have therefore 
noted in my private memoranda on the 
synonymy of insects: — 
‘ Ootes bradgpus, Schwalben (not of 
Scriptor, T.N.H.S. F.-c-D.).’ 
I told ‘Scriptor’ he ought in common 
justice to send you some apology for 
having imposed on you with such 
trash, and I hope I made him feel 
ashamed of himself. As I believe I 
have now silenced both the combatants 
who have appeared on the field, I trust 
that your pages will at present have 
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