Societies and Academies

Abstract

LONDON. Entomological Society, October 5.—Prof. E. B. Poulton, F.R.S., president, in the chair.—Mr. G. H. Verrall exhibited specimens of (a) Callicera yerburyi, Verr., a Syrphid new to science, taken this year in Scotland by Colonel J. W. Yerbury, and (b) C. aenea, F., the other British species of the genus, together with three European species of Callicera, C. macquatii, C. spinolae, and C. porrii.—Mr. H. St. J. Donisthorpe exhibited Tetropium fuscum, L. (o and o+) ana Abdera 4-fasciata, Curt., taken by him at Market Bosworth, Leicestershire.—The Rev. F. D. Morice exhibited cells constructed by two wasps, Polistes gallicus and Eumenes coarctatus, found by him in the Balearic Islands.—Mr. A. J. Chitty exhibited specimens of the earwig Apterygida media (albipennis), found originally by Westwood, and hitherto recorded only from Norfolk. He had taken the species at Huntingfield and Charing, Kent, this year.—Mr. W. J. Lucas exhibited a living specimen of Labidura riparia, from the shore near Christchurch, Hants, kept alive for more than a month, and fed upon fruit, meat, &c.—Prof. Hudson Beare exhibited on behalf of Mr. C. J. C. Poole specimens of Aulonium sulcatum, Oliv., a beetle new to the British fauna.—Mr. W. Dannatt exhibited a specimen of Papilio homerus from the Blue Mountains, Jamaica, and three new butterflies, Chlorippe godmani, from Venezuela, Delias hempeli, from Gilolo, and Monethe johnstoni, from British Guiana.—Dr. T. A. Chapman exhibited for Mr. Hugh Main a terato-logical specimen of Arctia caja, bred this year. Immediately below the costa the left hind wing divided into three layers, each of which was apparently a normal wing so far as form, colour, and markings went, but which, when the insect was alive, were so closely applied to each other as to look like one normal wing, until they were separated.—Mr. F. Merrifield exhibited pod-like galls found on a terebinthine shrub in the limestone region of Auvergne, apparently those of Pemphigus cornicularius.—Mr. Norman Joy exhibited the black variety of Bledius taurus. Germ., taken at Wells, Norfolk, August, 1904; Bledius femoralis, Gyll, from Wokingham, Berks, a species that has not been taken in the British Isles for more than fifty years; Polydrucsus sericens, from Hampshire; Neuraphes carinatus, Mul., from Bradfield, near Reading; a small form of Dyschirius politus, Dej., taken at Bridlington and at Wokingham; and a Rhizotrogus (? species), taken in some numbers near Streatley, Berks.—Dr. F. A. Dixey exhibited some preparations of the scent of male Pierine butterflies, and read a note descriptive of the same.—Mr. H. J. Turner exhibited living examples of the larva of Phorodesma smaragdaria from the Essex marshes. He also contributed notes on the life-histories, and living larvas and cases, of several Coleophorids, among them C. vibicella, a species which, although generally distributed on the Continent, has only been recorded from a few English localities.—Mr. G. J. Arrow read a paper on sound production in the lamellicorn beetles.—Prof. C. Aurivillius communicated a paper on new species of African Striphnapterygidee, Notdontidse, and Chrysapalonidae in the British Museum.—Mr. A. H. Swinton communicated a paper on the droughts and weather, and insect increase and migration.—Mr. E. Ernest Green communicated a paper on some new mosquitoes from Ceylon, by Frederick V. Theobald.