THE 
WEEKLY ENTOMOLOGIST. 
“entoma quidquid agunt nostri est farrago libelli.” 
No. 31.] SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1863. [Price 2 d . 
m'EEDm. 
"ITT AS it Silvio Pellico who 
' ' trained a spider to be conscious 
of his friendship ? We read the 
story long ago ; and can remember 
the thrilling interest that it 
awakened— the picture of the worn 
out prisoner, exchanging the signs 
of regard with his extraordinary 
insect. Had the imagination of the 
wretched captive been allowed to 
expend its force on the ordinary 
objects of his fellow men, we can 
hardly think that, in his wildest 
moments, he would have entertained 
such a manifestly preposterous idea. 
Silvio Pellico must have had 
something of an entomologist about 
him. W e can remember the picture, 
in an old edition, of the prisoner 
gazing mournfully from a few dismal 
holes, which represented a window, 
while the noble spider, about the 
size of an ordinary clothes brush, 
peeped on him from a deep hole in 
the wall, which seemed to have been 
prepared for its special benefit. 
And yet, perhaps, we may take 
a lesson from the old story ; and, if 
we cannot get upon intimate terms 
with insects themselves, we may 
strive to become familiar with their 
history and habits. We may feed 
them like Pellico, though we shall 
take the precaution of putting a 
check upon their range in our bed 
rooms ; and we may watch them 
day by day, and seek to add new 
facts and new experiences to those 
that others have already gleaned. 
Breeding is, undoubtedly, more 
the fashion than it was. Almost 
every entomologist does something 
in larva collecting, and, in this, as in 
all other branches of the science, 
success attained is proportionate to 
effort displayed. 
Many of our readers will remem- 
ber the letters of “ Q.” He had 
not done anything marvellous ; but 
he had joined, to energy and per- 
severance, an uncommonly strong 
power of patient observation. The 
history of insects, like the history 
of men, is made up of little events. 
W e cannot look for great revolutions 
in the daily existence of either. 
These little events and character- 
stics that one mtui may pass by 
