58
THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
displayed contents of the green store boxes of Section III. is
considerable, because every card is pinned down. It is therefore
desirable to start with plenty of room and to leave ample space
for probable acquisitions, otherwise the curator will find that
he has at short intervals the long job of unpinning and pinning
down again a great many cards in order to get an addition into
its right place. The operation is tedious ; it makes holes in the
fingers, and is not without a very decided amount of danger
of damage to the specimens, as well as to the temper. In about
40 per cent. of the species of our Flora the fruit is dehiscent,
which means that a complete collection would number about
700, and would require 18 boxes at the rate of say 40 in each ;
there are also 230 varieties, which at the same rate would take
an additional six. or two dozen in all, whereas all the seeds of
our flora, including the varieties, can be curated in twelve of
the black store boxes.
There is, however, a way of economizing space in the green
boxes and saving all the trouble of pinning and unpinning when
re-arrangement is necessary. The specimens can be mounted
on the inside of the lid of a white box, gummed to a card for
the description, the body of the box being used as a lid if it be
deep enough. Small capsules can be put inside the lids of small
white boxes, which can be placed in pairs in the larger ones,
and the collection treated in other ways exactly like the seeds,
except that the last box in each row will have to be put into the
store box upside down, so that its description card may lie
over the lid of the one immediately above it, in order to get the
full number into each row.
Curating seeds in this way has its good points, but personally
I think the extra space, trouble and expense necessary for
displaying them is well worth while, especially when spread
over the long time that would be required to get even half of the
British Flora of one's own collecting ; nor do I personally
grudge the time spent in re-arranging.
A good deal of such work can be prevented if care be taken
not to mount half a dozen specimens when two or three are all
that is necessary. I may add that displayed mounts are far
better for work, and that there are many worse things than
having to re-arrange Section II. I am quite sure that among
all the beautiful things with which the field naturalist is blessed