THE 
WEEKLY ENTOMOLOGIST. 
“<ENTOMA Q/UrDQTJID AGUNT NOSTRI EST FARRAGO LIBELLI.” 
Mo. 22.] SATURDAY, JANUARY 10, 1863. [Price 2d. 
ONE THING AT A TIME. 
imagine there are some- 
where about twelve hundred 
individuals in this enlightened coun- 
try who call themselves Entomolo- 
gists. This number no doubt includes 
every variety and shade, from the 
merest beginner to the most advanced 
veteran. There are very few of those 
whose names are in the “Annual” 
who can be called ‘tyros,’ or ‘novices.’ 
The majority have probably a fair 
general knowledge of at least one 
order. "We should do well to ask 
ourselves whether the yearly results 
of their united labours, are such as 
might have been looked for from so 
large a number. It is quite true 
that the “Annual” is generally as 
full as it will hold, of discoveries, 
cfqitures of rarities, and other inter- 
esting notices. Yet, we cannot help 
feeling, after perusing its pages, how 
much has been accomplished by the 
few, and how little by the many. 
There are those well known names 
recurring again and again, but what 
do we hear of the doings of the great 
majority ? If we hear of a-new Ewpe- 
ihecia , we may generally hit on the 
discoverer in three or four guesses. 
If we are told about another Litliocol- 
letis or Nepticula added to our lists, 
or the discovery of a new mining 
larva, we have seldom to look far for 
the name of the finder. So charac- 
teristic indeed are particular branches 
of observation of particular men, that 
we can never think of certain Ento- 
mologists, without thinking of the 
group of insects in which they are 
“ great” so that in common parlance 
we designate one as the “ Ant-man,” 
another as the “ Eupithecia-man,” 
another as the “ Tortrix-man,” and 
a fourth as the “Tinea-man ” which 
mode of speaking of our illustrious 
contemporaries, though it may sound 
rather “free and easy,” so far from 
implying disrespect, is only the nat- 
ural expression of our sense of their 
superiority in this or that particular. 
Mow the drift of what we would say 
is this. Firstly, we regret it as an 
axiom which none will gainsay, that 
the results of the labours of the one 
thousand two hundred Entomologists 
in Great Britain, fall far short of 
their numbers. Secondly, we observe 
that the additions to Scientific know- 
ledge which are made from time to 
time, are for the most part, the fruit 
of those men’s exertions who have 
