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Letter, Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, 1906, Mar. 18

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Typewritten letter, 4 pages, from Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, "It snows cries the school-boy, and driving o'er the fields seems nowhere to alight says Emerson; then issues forth the storm with sudden burst and hurls the whole precipitated air down in a torrent says Thomson..."
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321301c-0123.jpg
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321301c-0123
title
Letter, Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, 1906, Mar. 18
description
Typewritten letter, 4 pages, from Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, "It snows cries the school-boy, and driving o'er the fields seems nowhere to alight says Emerson; then issues forth the storm with sudden burst and hurls the whole precipitated air down in a torrent says Thomson..."
transcription
[1906, Mar.18]

Did you ever read Mark Twain's "A Mediaeval Romance"? He started out
well enough, with plenty of incident and interest, and carries your atten-
tion to the climax of his story, where he admits in a post-addendum suffix
that the situation is too much for him, and that the characters may either
stay in the muddle or get out the best they can; for his part, he washes
his hands of the whole business. Wise old boy, Mark.

All of which has no bearing on the fact that Dr. Walther Horn, of
Berlin, recently sent me a collection of 100 specimens of tiger beetles
from German East Africa, Mozambique, Bismarck Archipelago, New Guinea,
and the Island of Banda, half of which places, if you are as ignorant
as I suspect, you will have to look up on the map. As for the number I
had to locate similarly, it is none of your darned business, and I am
surprised that you should say such a thing, and not only surprised, but
hurt. There were eight species, six of which I shall be able to give you,
as they are all the way from quadruplicated to twentyfiveplicated. I had
sent Horn a lot of Omaha tigers, chiefly Cicindela celeripes, which he
says prove to be chiefly Cicindela cursitans! They run together on the
lot next on the west, cursitans being the more numerous.

Wolcott gets worse and worse; he sent me a note a few days ago tell-
ing of collecting a lot of early spring tigers - about six species - and
signs it "Yours Cicindeliriously." It is very discouraging to have him
so trivial, after all my efforts to impress upon him the necessity and
the duty we all have to preserve the purity of the language and to pre-
serve a sweet dignity as we pass through this vale of tears: In spite of
all my advice, I have noted on several occasions when I have been with him
that he so far forgets himself as to laugh. Lord Chesterfield says that
"laughter is easily restrained by a very little reflection - - people
do not attend enough to its absurdity - - not to mention the disagreeable
noise that it makes, and the shocking distortions of the face that it
occasions - - how low and unbecoming a thing laughter is." But all this
glides off him like rain-drops from the scapulars of Aix sponsa; even my
presence does not restrain him.

We have some interesting dates for tigers in this country. I took
limbalis [added in pencil] C. limbalis [circled] in January, and Elizabeth found specimens in February; and in
latter February, on the Salt Basin, or in a clay-pit near it, Wolcott
found hundreds of C. splendida, amoena, limbalis, purpurea, a few vulgaris,
and three or four Audabonii.
Your brother sent me a note the other day to say that a friend of his
had a collection of beetles which he wished to give away to make room for
other things. We had a talk over the phone and I shall get the specimens in
a few days - a small collection, which however may contain some interesting
things. When I got his note what do you suppose I first thought of? Give
it up? Tater bugs. Funny that Trostler and tater bugs should the one
always suggest the other. Can you account for it?
date
3/19/1906
subject
Shoemaker, Frank H., 1875-1948
tablecontents/boxes/folders
Box 6
source/RG#/MS#
RG 32-13-01
isPartOf/Collection
Frank H. Shoemaker, Papers and Photographs
creator/photographer
Frank Shoemaker
rights
For copyright information, please contact the repository.
publisher
Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
language
English
media
321301c-0123.jpg
Item sets
Frank Shoemaker Correspondence - RG32-13-01
Site pages
Frank H Shoemaker, Letters 1906, March
Media
Typewritten letter, 4 pages, from Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, "It snows cries the school-boy, and driving o'er the fields seems nowhere to alight says Emerson; then issues forth the storm with sudden burst and hurls the whole precipitated air down in a torrent says Thomson..."Letter, Frank H. Shoemaker to I.S. [Isador] Trostler, 1906, Mar. 18