Article beginning on page 407.
Psyche 3:407-408, 1880.

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^syc^s, 467
smaller and more delicate species before they ENTOMOLOGICAL ITEMS.
DR. C. V. RILEY cnlls attention, in the
American waturdist for August 1882, to
JPo~'y/horajuiicta as an enemy of the egg- plant, in Georgia.
MR. JAMBS T. DEWEY records, in the JSuto- &gist for Jan. I 882, the capture of a large number of tepidoptera around an electric light'io Eastboyrne, England.
- A.CCORDING to a paper by Miss Mary H.
Hinckley in the American naturaht for
August 1882, the tree-toad (Hjh versicolor) feeds at first upon aphides but later its chief food is flies; both kinds of insects are taken on!y when alive.
A MO-NSTHOSITY in specimen of Melo-
Zoftfha vitlga-rh is described in the Entoma- hgtschenarkyichtett for 15 June 1882. This specimen has three feet on the left posterior leg. The leg is about two millimetres shorter than the corresponding leg on the other side of the insect.
IN THE meeting of the Linnean society of London, on 16 March 1882, Mr. Smith show- ed a bee caught alive in England, which had a profuse growth of the fsariu form of Cw- dicrfs $jfiecoceftiiala, a West Indian form, the-latter genus being closely allied to Cla- vicejs, or ergot.
IN THE Eniomologische wuchrkhtes for I
Sept. and I< Oct. 1882 are two short but in- teresting'com~nunications, one by Bieger and one by Gauckler, on the effect of the food- plant^ of Sepidopteroufi larvae on the proauc- tion of varieties. The species upon which results were recorded are Bolitbyx p#FC#$, Arciia cuja and Hudena $isin
. "MESSRS. WILKINSON and Lawson, I have
heard, used toplace their rubbish" from flood- ing of rivers "in a sieve, with a bag under- neath, and then put a little ammonia amongst it: the beetles immediately rushed away to escape froin the fumes, felt into the bag, and so were easily eliminated and captured; I have never tried this plan, but it seems feasi- + ble, unless the ahmonia should' 'kill the could escape.
A basin with steep sidee is
the best vessel in which to examine flood- refuse?" "The rubbish may be kept for a
long times, and yet be productive. It is always as full of larvae as of beetles, and these will breed out and fresh species kee appearing,"-W. W. Fowler in the Entom
Zogi~t, June 1882, v. 15, p. 125.
IN THE May (1882) meeting of the Lin-
nean Society of London, Mr. P. H. Gosse
made a communication "dealing with ciahp ing organs auxiliary to the generative parts in certain groups of iepidoptera. After
preliminary remarks the author mentions his mode of mnnipulation, and proceeds to a
description of the organs in question, finally deaiing with the modification of the apparatus as investigated in a very considerabk num- ber of the species of the genera Orai/ko//era and Papitto. ''
DR. 0. SCHMIEOEKMECHT, of Gumperda,
in Thiiringen, read a paper at one of the monthly meetings of the "Irmischia," at
Erfurt, recently, a short report of 'which appears in the E#ttof~o/@sche uachyichten, 15 Nov. 1882, jahrg. 7, p. 321-323; in winch he enumerated a large number of European species of BouiSus which are subject to wide variatio~ ,describing their varian t coiorational characters, and slating that even the male characters, which must be relied on for speci- fic diecrimination, are variable to some extent. Probably similar differences are to be detected in our own species.
DR. JULIUS NATHAN notices the lack of
sensitiveness of larvae of Eristalis to bad odors, in Kosmos, jahrg. 6, p. 298. Having had his attention called to the subject by an experiment of Darwin's. he sought to stupefy the larvae of Erisidis teaax, in the same way as he had done with lepidopterous larvae: The larvae of E^istitZis. however, took no notice of smail quantities of chloroform; it was only after Dr. Nathan used an amount of chlorofdrm sufficient to stupefy a child



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that he brought about a suspension of motion of the larvae. He concludes therefrom that the larvae of Erisfalh, which inhabit stink- ing water, are only slightly sensitive to strong-sinefling substances.-Tr. from En- iomogische nacfiricfttm, 15 Aug. 1882, jahrg. 8, p. 232.
. . - A '
A NEW MUSEUM PEST.-M~S. A. E.
Bush,
an esteemed correspondent of San [osri, Caf., complains lately in her letters of the ravages of a dermeitid in her insect collection, and from specimens, larvae and irnagos, lateiy sent to us, we find that the species in question is the handsome Perimefratoma variegatunt Horn. We do not find that this species was ever known before as a museum pest, and
there is danger that it may become distrib- uted in insect collections all over the country, just as have the other species of the same family, which are so well-known and dreaded by entomologists.-Amer. naturalist, Oct. 1832, v. 16, p. 826.
DR. BERGMANBY has lately shown that for- mic and acetic acids are met with, as constit- uents of protoplasm, throughout the whole vegetable kingdom, and can be regarded as constant products of metastasis in vegetable protoplasm. It is very likely that formic acid, at least, will be found in all insects, as soon as they have been carefully studied. Dr. Berginanti thinks it probable that propio- nic, butyric, caproic, or even this whole series of acids, are universally distributed in the vegetable kingdom. There are however, in my opinion, certain arresting processes in the retrogressive tissue-metamorphosis that muse insects to develop usually for the most part formic, sometimes butyric, rarely-as in beeswax-cerotic acid. G: D.
WE QUOTE the following interesting note
by J. Jenner Weir, from the EntowologlSt for July 1882: "Danaine butterflies not subject to the attack of mites.-In the Proceedings of the Entomological society for the year 1877, p. xii, Mr- Meldola remarks that 'he had observed that certain distasteful species of lepidoptera preserved their disagreeable qual- ities after death, in proof of which he exhib- ited some butterflies found among an old collection of Indian injects, the greater part of which had been demolished by mites.
The surviving specimens were all of protect- ed ~pecies, viz., four of a EQloea, one of Danais flwt&5as, and one of Papilio past- men. Euploea and Damif were well known
to be protected genera, since they serve for models of mimetic resemblances. With re- gard to PajiZiojiammon, Mr. Meldola stated that, in his belief, it was in some way die- tasteful, as he hnd seen it in swarms on the island of Nancoury, Nicobar islands, in
April, 1875.' In Mr. Meldoh's valuable
translation of Dr. Aug. Weiamann's 'Studies on the theory of descent,' p. 337, the transfa- tor, in a footnote, makes a similar statement. I lately became possessed of four cases of Indian lepidoptera, which had been almost entirely destroyed by mites, but the danaine butterflies were uninjured : there was one species of EnjMoca and four of Damis, in- cluding JD. chrysif$wf, D, limsiace, and D. Ylesi+s ; the specimens of Fajitio $am- man were also in fair condition."
LEPIDOPTSRA AND COLEOPTERA.
Inflated larvae and well prepared lepidtiptera and coleoptera of Europe, especially those of German sold at catalog-prices. Address
DR. OSKAR KKANCHEK,
Bayrische St-, is, It, r,
Leipzig. Germany.
WANTED.
Annual Reports entom. sac. of Ontario for 1870 and 1878.
Ltntner. Entomological contributions (any' part).
Riley. Reports state entom. Missouri (any year). . Address, stating price postpaid,
- EDITOR OF PSYCHE,
Cambridge, Mass,
No. 100 was issued xs Jan. 188$




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