The name which this pretty insect bears in the various languages
of Europe is clearly mythic. In this, as in other cases, the
Virgin has supplanted Freya; so that _Freyjuhaena_ and
_Frouehenge_ have been changed into _Marienvoglein_, which
corresponds with _Our Lady's Bird_. There, can, therefore, be
little doubt that the esteem with which the lady-bird, or Our
Lady's cow, is still regarded, is a relic of the ancient cult.]

* * * * *

MATHEMATICAL ARCHÆOLOGY.

Sir,--I cannot gather from your "Notes" that scientific archæology is
included in your plan, nor yet, on the other hand, any indications of
its exclusion. Science, however, and especially mathematical science,
has its archæology; and many doubtful points of great importance are
amongst the "vexed questions" that can only be cleared up by
_documentary evidence_. That evidence is more likely to be found mixed
up amongst the masses of papers belonging to systematic collectors than
amongst the papers of mere mathematicians--amongst men who never destroy
a paper because they have no present use for it, or because the subject
does not come within the range of their researches, than amongst men who
value nothing but a "new theorem" or "an improved solution."

As a general rule I have always habituated myself to preserve every
scrap of paper of any remote (and indeed recent) period, that had the
appearance of being written by a literary man, whether I {133} knew the
hand, or understood the circumstance to which it referred, or not. Such
papers, whether we understand them or not, have a _possible value_ to