THE ENTOMOLOGIST’S WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER. 
181 
Society, and might send their papers to 
that Society. It appears to me a decided 
mistake for the Presidents of these 
Societies to rail at other Societies or 
Journals, instead of examining into the 
causes which prevent the papers being 
sent to their Societies, and which force 
persons who have been induced to join 
the Society to combine together to form 
a medium for the publication of their 
communications to Science, instead of 
sending them to the Society of which 
they are Members or Fellow's. 
Now, confining my attention to the 
Entomological Society, I feel assured 
that the origin of the ‘ Journal ’ is easily 
explained, by the fact that the papers 
that are sent to the Society lay for such 
a length of time unpublished that almost 
all the interest in the paper is lost before 
it reaches the public eye; this delay is 
occasioned by the dilatory way in which 
the business of the Society is conducted. 
Until lately, one of the means used to 
delay the appearance of the communica- 
tions was to refer each paper from the 
Publication Committee to one or more 
referees, with whom the paper sometimes 
remained for mouths, yet the result was 
always uniform, and might have been 
predicted before the paper was sent, for 
I believe no referee ever recommended 
that a paper should not be printed, 
though he might have been a month 
making up his mind, and so rendering 
the paper comparatively useless. This 
rule has now -been abiogated, yet what 
with the Publication Committee, the 
Council, and the other obstructions, even 
now it takes, on an average, nine months 
beloie a paper sees the light. I know for 
a fact that this prevents some Members 
from sending their papers, and it has 
caused others to withdraw them from the 
Society alter they have been read there, 
in order to have them printed elsewhere ; 
and this no doubt has caused the Mem- 
bers to start a ‘Journal’ of their own, 
at their own expense, though they are 
Members of or Subscribers to the Society. 
The balance-sheet shows me that this 
delay does not arise from want of funds, 
and therefore it is within the province of 
the President and Council to correct this 
state of things. 
I am, Sir, 
Yours, &c., 
J. E. Ghay, Pli.D. 
British Museum , 
March 4, 1861. 
NATURAL HISTORY OF THE 
TINEINA. 
When this work was first announced, 
and we were receiving the names of 
subscribers, we were very particular to 
write to each subscriber to state that we 
had received his name, and had had 
much pleasure in adding it to the list of 
subscribers. We thought by this means 
we prevented the possibility of a mis- 
take, yet we found, directly the subscrip- 
tion list was closed, Mr. A. said, “ I told 
you I intended to subscribe.” Mr. B. 
said, “ I asked Mr. C. to give you my 
name as a subscriber.” Mr. D. ex- 
claimed that he had asked Mr. E., when 
he saw Mr. F., to ask him to be so good 
as to intimate his wish to subscribe to 
the ‘Natural History of the Tineina,’ 
&e., &c. 
To all this we simply replied the door 
was closed, and we could not open it. 
Hinc multce lachrymce! 
Now we see a mistake that we com- 
mitted; we wrote to each subscriber 
when we received his name, but those 
who thought they were subscribing were 
