Article beginning on page 133.
Psyche 6:133, 1891.

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~ugust 1~91.J PSYCHE. 133
whether such a periodical should be open to direct contributions from others than the divisional force and those in the state exper- iment stations working in concert with them. Particularly technical articles like Lord Willsingham's seem out of place, and it
would be hard to justify them, when there are plenty of openings for their publication and they have only a very indirect bearingon economic entomology. Were such articles
omitted, the periodical would certainly gain in character, and as it is, quite apart from its value on the purely economic side, no ento- mological periodical in the world is so rich in interesting and varied notes on the habits of insects.
Apropos of the "jumping-bean" which is
twice mentioned in this number of Insect life, once in the answer to correspondents and again in the proceedings of the Ento- mological society of Washington, it may be well to call attention to a recently published foreign paper on Ca~coca'psa sali'ilans, and on another and nearly allied moth, Gra-
fholitha motrix, which causes similar no\ e- ments in the fruit of Colliguaya brasi/i~usis in Uruguay : the article, by Dr. Bera; of Montevideo, will be found in the Anales of the Sociedad cientifica argentina, vol. 31. The new moth is particularly interesting since the motor power in Dr. Riley's new jumping- bean is recognized by him as also a
Grapholitha.
Kolbe's Introduction to the knowledge of insects is so good that one must scold at its slow appearance.
Begun in 1889, it has only
reached its sixth number, and to judge by the scheme laid down in the prospectus it is not a quarter finished; we hope it is not, for though we find some oversights, it contains a rare collection of facts and some very in- teresting discussions ; the present number deals with the structure of the legs and of the abdomen ; the account of the ovipositor and of the claspers seems rather meagre
though possibly more is to be given in the next part.
A MOULTING-HABIT OF LARVAE OF PLA-
TYSAMIA CEANOTHI.-In watching a brood of ceanothi larvae, which are living on wild cherry, my attention has been drawn to a habit, noticed at each moult, and which I have not seen in other Bombycid larvae.
When first becoming quiet the larva spun a loose web to the twig just in front of its head, at a short distance. When the mask had fallen and the skin split in moulting, the larva grasped this loose web with its first pair of feet, and pulled itself along by it, till all the feet were free and could cling to the silk. Then moulting proceeded by the usual contraction and expansion of the muscles. This was done by every larva at every moult. Caroline G. Sode.
A "Manual of North American Butter-
flies" by C. J. Maynard has just been pub- lished by DeWolfe, Fiske, & Co. of Boston. It is an octavo of over 200 pp. with ten plates and numerous figures in the text, and de- scribes more than 600 nominal species. The first thing which strikes one on looking it over is the total absence of the slightest allusion to any of the early stages of butter- flies, excepting that a single chrysalis is fig- tired. The only reference to the fact that they have n history-a history the study of which forms the chief charm and interest in these insects, and the one thing to which all novices should be pointed-is in some such curt statementas "occurs in June and July." Not even a single reference either general or particular is given to show that such life' histories are known; we believe the word '.larvaw or "caterpillar" does not appear be- yond the third page where the body of the work begins. The second thing we notice, considering that the book "is intended for the use of the tyro as well as for the advanced student," is the absence of a single table to distinguish the different genera of a family, or the different species of a genus. Thirty- five genera of Nymphalidae, for instance, to be distinguished by the tyro with no other



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PSYCHE.
[ August 1891.
aid than plodding through each of the de- scriptions in turn to see which fits best; or fifty-three species of Argynnis in a similar plight except that here the rough but fairly good figures of the under side of a hind wing materially aid the comparison; or again
eighty-six species of Pamphila where even figures of a single wing are wanting in more than two thirds of the species! For such characteristics as these, no possible excel- lence in the descriptions or the sequence, or even in the illustrations could possibly atone. It is planned upon wrong lines-a
dreary guide to a delightful study. Better a single life-history well worked out, to beget a wish to learn more, than the whole of it. Butterflies are not lifeless postage-stamps, and should not be treated as such.
A very lively and interesting account is given in the last number of the Journal of the Cincinnati society of natural history of the wanderings and collections of a "Cin- cinnati boy in the tropics," William Do- herty, who entirely without funds has wan- dered all through the east, making fine col- lections in natural history, especially in- sects, and paying his way by their sales. Through perils and adventures innumerable he seems so far to have escaped with his life ; "my beggar-like and dilapidated garb was my safeguard against robbers," he says, "and my running after butterflies was calcu- lated to impress them that I was a harmless lunatic and so I got through where a more pretentious personage might have failed." Reference was made in our June number,
p. 100, to the reported death of Kiinckel, and discredit given to the story that he had been overcome by locusts in Algiers. It now
appears that the entire story must have been a fabrication, for records have
reached us of
two or three meetings of the French entotno- logical society (of which he was once presi- dent) subsequent to the date of his reported death, and no sort of reference to such an event appears, though at least one necrolo- gical notice is given; moreover Kiinckel has since that date been appointed upon a com- mittee of the society, and presented papers both to it and to the French Academy ! We observe that Entomological news publishes the telegram from Algiers as if it had no doubt of its truth.
PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES.
CAMBRIDGE ENTOMOLOGICAL CLUB.
14 February, 1890.-The 151st meeting of
the Club was held at 156 Brattle St., Mr. S. H. Scudder in the chair.
The annual report of the librarian, post- poned from the January meeting, was read and accepted. The auditors announced that the report of the treasurer was correct, and it was accepted.
Dr. H. A. Hagen asked the opinion of
those present concerning books on entomol- ogy for the use of beginners and amateurs. Our common insects, Half-hours with in-
sects, and Entomology for beginners, by Dr. Packard, and Comstock's Introduction were mentioned as the most available.
Mi-. S. H. Scudder read from a letter of Mr. James Fletcher an account of damage
done to the pine staves of the water pipes of the Ottawa (Can.) water system. The pipes have been in use fifteen years.
The destruc-
tion is supposed to be due first to the decay- ing of a very thin layer of the surface of the wood through the chemical action of river water, and then to the removal of the de- cayed surface by aquatic beetles. Beetles, be- longing to Dryops and Macronychus were
found in the injured wood; also larvae pro- visionally referred to the same genera.
Mr. Scudder read an account of the habits of spiders, by Jonathan Edwards, written in the last century, and recently published in the Andover Review.
Mi-. Scudder also read a letter from Mr. E. A. Smyth, Jr., giving his observations on the habits and relative abundance of several coliads found in North and South Carolina. (See Psyche, v. 5, p. 334.)




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