[May, 
296 Analyses of Books. 
The difficulty — first raised, we believe, by the “ Edinburgh 
Review,” and admitted by Darwin — is that variation, though 
useful, would be generally lost by subsequent intercrossing with 
ordinary individuals. Yet there are cases on record where an 
abnormally formed animal, though mated with a perfectly normal 
individual of the opposite sex, has transmitted its pecularities 
unimpaired, and even intensified, to its offspring. 
The following passage is worthy of note : — “ We admire the 
structure of the fore limbs (so well adapted for burrowing) of the 
mole ; but the rabbit, an unsurpassed burrower, is no more 
adapted for burrowing than its congener the hare, which never 
burrows; the snake ( Trop . natrix), without fins, like the viper, 
is a rapid and graceful swimmer, while the latter rarely goes near 
the water.” Such instances might be multiplied to a large extent. 
In any case they cut in several directions at once. 
On the same page, in a note bearing upon a question which 
has been lately raised, Mr. Pascoe says — “ Without denying the 
advantages of concealment for safety, I have been struck with 
the habit of Brazilian butterflies alighting nearly in the centre of 
a leaf, where, of course, they are most conspicuous: only one 
exception occurs to me — Helicopsis cupido, which almost inva- 
riably seeks the under side. I have never seen a bird touch a 
butterfly.” We have lately seen it questioned whether birds ever 
capture butterflies at all. We must confess we never saw a bird 
in the aCt ; but we have seen the damaged wings of butterflies, 
lacking the body, in situations where they could only be accounted 
for as having been left by some bird which had devoured the 
remainder. On the other hand, Dr. Fritz Muller, in order to 
prove that the protection which inseCts obtain by dint of peculiar 
odours, mimetism, and the like is far from perfeCt, forwarded to 
the Entomological Society a case of butterflies all of which had 
apparently been struck at by birds. Mr. Bates, too (“ Naturalist 
in Nicaragua,” p. 316), speaks of having observed a pair of birds 
bringing butterflies to their young. But not a few observers 
whom we have questioned have never seen a butterfly actually 
captured by a bird. 
On one point we must join issue with Mr. Pascoe. He writes : 
“ In the Scarabaeidae we find one seCtion passing their lives in 
mammalian excreta, and another seCtion living in flowers or 
among foliage, they having the same peculiar laminiferous an- 
tennae, which on the theory of special advantage should hardly 
be suitable to both.” But all, or nearly all, the Lamellicornes 
are very limited in their selection of food, and, being for the 
most part slow crawlers and heavy flyers, they require senses 
which may direCt them at once to their food. We think Mr. 
Pascoe will find, on examination, that the complexity of the 
antennae in inseCts varies almost inversely as the locomotive 
powers, and as the development of the eyes. 
The matter in the pamphlet before us would have been drawn 
out by certain writers into a bulky volume. 
