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EDITORIAL. People who have all the graces Never litter sylvan places, For their graces leave no traces On the ground. BUT what is the use of bothering about litter, when our government strew their—er—volted Pylons athwart the welkin ? Dr. Vinter writes from Castor Hanglands in Northants that he has obtained eggs of the Chequered Skipper butterfly there, though the most outstanding family of those majestic woodlands this year is the Pylonidae whereof fully-developed examples sixty feet in expanse have newly emerged : however, he quite failed to capture a specimen for his cabinet! We much regret that no reference to Pylons figures on the 13 October 1933 agenda at Buxton of the Rural England Preservation Society. O U R ACTIVE
MUSEUMS.
With the model Ipswich and Norwich, budding Lowestoft and Thetford, museums before our eyes, it is indeed good news that at long length the Bury Town Council has awakened to its public duty and is putting M O Y S E S H A L L to rights. Last February a trained curator was borrowed for a couple of months from one of the Cambridge museums, who thoroughly overhauled the mass of recent presentations that had gradually accumulated for years. This had been promiscuously dumped in an empty Upper Chamber of that Hall; much of it was found to be of priceless value, much—stuffed parrots, ethnological specimens, fourlegged chickens, et hoc genus omne—rubbish. The work is not premature : " When I (Dr. Ticehurst in ' Suffolk Birds,' p. 21) first saw the collection of the Rev. J. B. P. Dennis' Birds in 1912, it was in verv fair order considering its sixty years' age [he died in October 1861] ; but in 1927 it was in the last stages of decay, with glass cases broken, resulting in moth and dust." The odium of such culpable neglect of public property lies with the Council, nor does replacement adequatelv represent historic specimens : fortunately none were specific types. This Museum is now brought up to an altogether scientific footing ; and our sole fear is that the clearance may have been too drastic during the absence of the new curator, our Mammals Recorder, Mr. Henry Andrews, who was appointed (in accordance with our Society's suggestion) on 11 July last. Mr. Andrews has been studying the fauna of Egypt, Palestine and Arabia deserta, at first hand since June. During August he was in Jerusalem, after taking an " informal Excursion " of some three hundred miles, as a Bedawy on camels with three perfect Bedawins who had no English, into the N.W. Arabian desert. His return in October, with interesting baggage, was hailed with satisfaction.