Letters from Alexander Henry Haliday to Hermann Loew, December 1867 and 186-
Letters from Alexander Henry Haliday to Hermann Loew, December 1867 and 186-
My dear Dr Loew' According to M. Bigot’s [1] latest information Apistomyia [2] has the terminal spurs of the kind tolerably long—those of the anterior pairs evanescent. This agrees with your conclusion on ground of Analogy and confirms the family character. No additional information on other points. I have written to Westwood [3] queries about the Zett. type of Anthalia furcata . The new year came in dreary here, but by noon it cleared up and continued fair till the evening of following day. I took advantage of this unwonted favour for a walk in the woods. Without looking on the ground or at roots or in bark of trees I took with the sweeping net eight spp of Ortalidae (in Rondani’s sense) several + Ortalis rufipes one, Aciura coryli (Rossi), one Tephritis formosa 1 or 2, pulchra several, matricariae several, Oxyna bidentis (= elongatula?), tessellata one. Bibio RD in abundance siculus (sevl), common, but males only. (+ Tipula berteii is departed). Pyralus N. unionalis. Xylocopa violacea Mantis oratoria [4], spallanzania, Bacillus rossi [5], Chrysopa______ but not Lestes which I have taken on new year’s day in other years. Tetanocera arrogans etc etc etc etc. A larva (half grown) of Ceroplatus on Boletes of the Olive. I had a note yesterday from Von Kiesenwetter [6] exulting in Cassida deflexicollis which I had sent him as pith of a quill-barrel, in my last letter;—jokingly he says the bestiola has cost some of his friends their nights’ rest. I am glad to be able to send a few more opiate pills for them. Stainton [7] is at Florence now, Dohm [8] will be detained at home yet ten days or a fortnight—so they will not meet till at Rome or Naples. H.T.S. thinks Dohm not unlikely to proceed on to Messina (where his son A D [9] is) when they turn their faces homeward… That would be a temptation would it not for me. If I am free at that time especially as we do not expect any of the scattered members of my family to rejoin us till late in summer. Today also I received some information desired, from Palermo about the Madonia [10] mts. Nebrodi [11] is a paradise for botanists to judge from Gussoni’s [12] habitats. But that would not be in season before in June snow and storms predominating the earlier part of the year. I await Stainton’s reply,—whether Madame T. is to go to the mountain, or the mountain etc etc. Besides the flowers lingering on from autumn Scabiosa centaurea , Dianthus, Borago, Tripolum, Bellis, Hypochaeris - and Helleborus viridia naturally in full bloom, we gathered in the groves and fields on 1st January in flower Viola adorata, Anemone stellata, Lavandula stocchas—anticipations of the spring to come.? Ever your truly A.H. Halliday [letter ends]
[last page of another letter] insect population as usual in the sulphur-vents and under stones. G.O. Costa [13]the patriarch of the Italian Entomologists is lately dead. In consequence, I suppose I have not heard from Achille Costa [14] to whom I had written to inquire after his venture in the Terra d’Otranto (where he spent a month about the bees of the summer) and since about the project of an Entomological Society for Italy. South of him I can hear of no entomological living unless we take in Malta geographically where Sr Schembri [15] resides. But that is doubtful territory or rather more likely to have been once joined to Africa—as the blood of the people is African, and their language. And now having exhausted my time I must reserve my remaining subjects for a more regular reply to your letter. Yours very truly Alexr H. Haliday
Villa Pisani. Lucca 23 Decr 1867. to Dr H Loew
E P W [16] has been very successful, if his luck has continued as it was at first, all imaginable and unimaginable contingencies from shipwreck to murder having concurred to deprive him of means and time for the exploration he had planned. After all and at this season when as the Revd. Dr. Berenger [Adolph von Berenger (1815-1895)] writes me word all is snow about Vallembrosa [17] and the fierce wind whistling constantly I believe I must make my mind up to go thither. The forest school which closes next month is not likely to reopen till September. Whereas I had calculated on deferring my visit only to the Spring. So if I can get in the replies from the yet unpledged members of the founding Committee and have the general circular to the expected future members follow so as to launch the Entomological Society [18] for next year. I think I will escape to Florence about the new year’s day & plough my way on to Vallembrosa. Perhaps I may (besides accomplishing my immediate object) discover Chionea [19] there, which Ihave never seen alive. Diptera have nearly vanished here now except the perennial Trichocera, Chirononea??, Mycetophilae, Culex and here & there rarely Opetia (which is rather abnormal insect in Tuscany)and a few surviving Dacus oleae [20] —and some species of Tephritis-Chlorops-- , Phora. It was different at this time last year when I might have enlarged the list much. Did I send you a copy of the brochure—Iapyx [21] , a new genus—from the Linn. Soc. Transactions? It is not Dipterous, but allied to Campodea. My chance of seeing Vesuvius in action this winter is diminished. A friend at Florence had intended going to Rome, and I with him; and then the further journey to Naples would not have deterred me—but he has been ill & must now take more care of himself and I do not think of making the journey (the whole of it) alone. I had seen Vesuvius [22] while the lava flood of 1861 was still rough & unworn: and already the rim of the water had its … [letter ends]
Dear Doctor Loew,Having some weight to spare on a letter to Berlin while I have not time to set down to write a regular answer to your long kind & instructive letter of the ________ I avail myself of the opportunity to reply to inform you that I got it in due course and to express my sincere concern that you have been so much of a sufferer to your health after your agreeable journey in the Bavarian Alps. I regret much that you feel yourself reduced to the alternative of giving up your favourite study to the great loss of the Science—or your official position with the chief part of the Realschule . I trust the resolution you have come to will prove indeed to be for your good whole health which does seem to demand repose at last and that your future excursions and scientific pursuits without overstraining your powers will be an antidote to the ennui which often creeps over those who have lived a continual active life, when they seek repose after it. I hope too that your comparative future leisure will make room for a more frequent correspondence and that it may open the way for our yet meeting though we may not either of us flatter ourselves with the prospect of many more travelling years. A couple of days ago I had a letter dated off Messina and in a very unsteady hand on a boisterous sea from my young friend Dr E. P. Wright on his way home from the Seychelles islands where he has been spending the past summer. Sicily he wrote ,was looking “very cold”—but he was enjoying the thought of a visit with me to Etna & in the coming summer. He says nothing of the late results of his collecting in the islands, but I do not imagine it … [letter ends]
… pleasure in placing them in your hands for examination & publication of the new material, you might find among them. I have had no communication with him, by letter, since I left Paris, finding my time insufficient for the letters of first obligation—not all yet discharged. I snatched a few minutes for some more desultory researches among Meigen’s Diptera at the Garden of Plants, and when I have leisure to look out & decypher [sic] my pencil notes, will communicate to you such few as are likely to possess any interest for you. Since my return here, I have heard from Winnertz [23], whose absence from home had prevented my receiving a reply to a line announcing, from London, my intended visit to Aix la Chapelle. He tells me his long-harboured and long-expected Monograph of Mycetophilidae is to appear in the Linnaea Entomologica of this present year. Perhaps it is already published—and it may possibly embrace what I provisionally regard as a new genus of the family,—allied to Asindulum , but the proboscis much longer, with the labella short, and the rostrum or prolongation of the head short, so that the very small palpi are near the base of the apparent probosces, & accumbent to its sides, so as to be very [illegible text]. Another n. s. (perhaps) is a very minute insect of the family Bombylidae, of which I had found one specimen last year; and have got several more, in the pine-woods of the sandy coast of Viareggio [24] , this summer. It may perhaps be a Sphaerogaster Zett. [25] , which on account of the small alulae, I conjecture to belong to this family, rather than Acroceridae I find, on these coasts, all the three species of -- which we have in the British Fauna. On a late visit, with Mr Wright to the rocky sea coast near Livorno, I met with one specimen of Discomyza cimiciformis,—also with a new species of Psilopa, allied to - with wings more spotted than in any other species; of this also but one; also one (the pxxx I have found) of Aphrosylus - has occurred.
As far as my more limited collecting has enabled me to judge the present is a better year for insects here,than the last was: Dr Dale [26] too writes to me from Dorsetshire, that insects have reappeared there, which he had not met with for thirty years previously. He sent me his carte de visite photograph on the same letter. I got, in the course of my little tour in the spring, a small collection of photograph portrait of entomologists, my friends, Wesmael [[27]] , Lacordaire [28] , Sichel [29] , Mulsant [30] , Javet [31] , Goureau [32], to add to the few English ones I possessed. May I hope to crown the collection with yours? In anticipation I send you my own, (having been asked for such, several times, since I have been absent from England,) I found time to have taken at Rome. My friends here consider it a good likeness. probably you may have not been in the way of hearing of the disposal of the late J. Curtis’[33] entomological collection. His British collection—the best general one— and most trustworthy one as to the nature of the specimens (unless it be that of Stephens [34] —now in the British Museum—and this was much inferior to it as to number of species and nomenclature unless in the Coleoptera & Lepidoptera) has been purchased for the Museum of Melbourne University (Australia) for £500 sterling. The collection of insects injurious to the field & garden with the transformation, parasites &c for £100.The Australians are showing thus early a commendable zeal for Natural History,—expending considerable sums for collections, and books; and and Entomological Society has been formed out there. For the sake of Curtis’ widow & young children, I rejoice the collection has been disposed of to such advantage for them; but its local value ceases, in a great measure, with its removal from England; and it will be a loss for many years to all future labourers on the Insect Fauna of Britain. Dale laments, with reason, that English Entomologists care for little but Coleoptera and Lepidoptera, in general. He still (now near 80 years of age) keeps up his collecting of Diptera &c actively, and is training up his two elder boys about 8 & 10 years of age to tread in his footsteps each having his own little collection—and he celebrates in his last letter some of their rare captures. And now in default of order & scientific material having given you this medley “de omnibus rebus et quibus dam aliis”, I must limit myself to this third sheet. Whatever other excursions I may make this year a letter addressed to me at “Lucca” will always find me, and ever yours sincerely, Alex R. Haliday.
… side of the Apennines, only accelerated his own journey home, by the arrangement; as Pirazzoli’s [35] professional duties ultimately defeated their plan. After Naples, we spent three weeks more, at Rome; fully occupied—as one must be on a first visit to such a shrine of pilgrimage. The weather, part of the time, was rather oppressive:—even I found it expedient to take febrifuges daily for a week; and my friend Hogan [36] at last escaped to the hills of Frascati [37] , to spend the few last days out of the malarian influence. My brother was too much absorbed in the remains of antiquity, and the objects of art, to be torn away from the city;—but I took the opportunity of two days excursion to Tivoli [38] ; to ascend the Mons Lucretilis [39] a day’s excursion—nine hours in saddle, & four on foot;—a charming ride through the greatest variety of flowering shrubs I have ever observed in native woodland,—and this gushing with the songs of Birds, —a rare luxury in Italy, where Robin Redbreast himself is shot down & eaten. A first visit to a country so interesting in other respects, and in the company of friends whose taste lies elsewhere,—is not of course very favourable for Nat. Hist. objects;—and I scarcely had an opportunity of forming an idea of the products. Vesuvius surprized me by the abundance of insect life on the life of the crater (of which I see —on referring to Engelmann [40] & Carus [41] [1861. Bibliotheca zoologica Leipzig] —that O. Costa long since published a notice, in the Naples Academy’s Transaction). The carnivorous species, of which there was a - might feed indeed some herbivorous prey,—but these latter had no visible pabulum, except effervescent sulphur, in such a situation. The lake Fusaro [42], which now holds the place of the Lucrine,—as regards the production of oysters—was richly peopled along the edge, even then in early April, with genuine Ephydrae. At Naples, I saw as much of A. Costa, as our constant sightseeing allowed. The Dipterous collection—made chiefly by his secretary—disappointed me, as to the extent of it, though containing some very choice specimens, —Ochthebius etc. At Rome, I found no entomological society. Mr Seidlitz [43](a Livonian—the present possessor of Gerstaeker’s [44] collection of Coleoptera) whose acquaintance I made at Naples,, had indicated to me one Entomologist, a Dane (Bergsoe) [45] at present resident there (at Rome); but unfortunately he was in the country near Palestrina, when we came to Rome,& returned to town only the day I left it for Tivoli. I hear he was very successful in collecting there (Coleoptera—I suppose only). The neighbourhood of Rome I should think very favourable—but I had no leisure for collecting myself there. Indeed I have had very little time disposable for that purpose, all this summer. After our return to Lucca, I had to go with Mr Hogan, to try different situations—he finding some sufficiently cool for his summer quarters. Ultimately he proceeded northwards, and is now at Thun [46] or elsewhere on the other side of the Alps, awaiting some of his family from England, who are to join him for the journey home. In consequence, I had to leave my brother to make his visit to Florence alone: where he finding the heat of May almost intolerable, staid [sic] only a week more; and by some misinformation as to the Railway trains, he missed meeting me on his way to England, at Pisa, where I spent a day awaiting him. After his departure, we had visits here from some families of friends, also on their way back to England; which filled up the time till the arrival of my young friend Dr Wright who joined me here on the 29th ult., coming through the Salzkammergut [47] … [letter ends