676 



INSECTA. 



Mr. Hope in the proceedings of the Entomological Society. Those of Angola are described by Ericnson 

 in his Archives; and those of Congo by White, in the Annals of Nat. Mist., Vol. XII. The last- 

 named author, with Mr. Doubleday, has also described the insects of New Zealand in the supplement 

 to Dieffen'oach's Travels. Many new species from Cape Palmas, on the Gold Coast of Africa, are 

 described by Mr. Hope in the Annals of Nat. Hist. The Symbolae Physicse contains a great number 

 of species from Arabia and Egypt, beautifully figured and described by Dr. Klug. A great number 

 of new species from the Himalayan regions of India, are described by Kollar and Redtenbacher in 

 Hugel's Travels in Cachmere <fec, lately published. Many new forms which it will be impossible 

 for me to particularize in this supplement, are described and figured by Dr. Burmeister in his 

 Genera Insectorum, recently completed. The insects of Russia, Siberia, &c, have been greatly 

 investigated, and descriptions of them published by Fischer, Gebler, Kolenati, &c, in the Bulletin of 

 the Moscow and Petersburgh Societies. 



The investigation of the transformations and natural history of various insects, more especially 

 such as are obnoxious to mankind by their devastations upon the products of the garden or orchard, 

 or upon other materials, has especially been attended to within the last few years. A very beautiful 

 work on the species injurious to forest and fruit trees, by Ratzeburg, has appeared in three volumes, 

 4to., with a great number of splendid plates. Another valuable work by Dr. T. W. Harris, has ap- 

 peared in America, entitled a Report upon the Insects of Massachusets injurious to Vegetation, 

 in one volume, 8vo. ; whilst in our own country, a number of papers by Mr. Curtis, have appeared in 

 the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, on the insects which attack the turnip, 

 wheat, oats, barley, and other crops. The pages of the Gardener's Chronicle have also contained a 

 series of articles upon Garden Insects, by Mr. Curtis and myself. Many papers on the Transforma- 

 tions of Insects, by Dufour, Perris, &c, have appeared in the Annals of the French Entomological 

 Society. An annual series of reports on the Progress of Entomology, published by Dr. Erichson in 

 his Archives and the Annual Addresses of the Presidents of the Entomological Society of London, 

 contain a great fund of instruction, and must be referred to by every one wishing to keep au courant 

 with the rapid progress of entomological science. 



Various important memoirs on the Anatomy of Insects have also recently appeared, chiefly by Leon 

 Dufour, especially his Anatomical and Physiological Researches upon the Hemiptera, Orthoptera, 

 Hymenoptera, and Diptera, in two volumes, 4to., and many other detached memoirs by the same 

 author, as well as several by Mr. Newport, in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. 

 A series of anatomical monographs has also been commenced by Stein, the first of which is devoted 

 to the female organs of generation in the Coleoptera; a memoir by the same author on the organs of 

 generation of the Myriapoda, appeared in Miiller's Archives, 1842. The uses of the Antenna; have 

 also formed the subject of several memoirs by Duponchel (Revue Zoologique); Newport (Trans. 

 Ent. Soc); Goureau (Annales Ent. Soc. France); and especially by Erichson, in his excellent Dis- 

 sertatio de Fabrica et Usu Antennarum in Insectis, Berlin, 1847, 4to., in which the opinions that 

 these organs are instruments of smelling, is maintained and supported by their minute anatomy. 



A paper upon the animals found in the underground Mammoth Cave in Kentucky, by Dr. Tell- 

 kampf, announces the singular fact, that most of the insects found in this locality are either entirely 

 blind, or have the eyes almost rudimental ; and the same fact has also been discovered by M. 

 Schiodte with respect to a number of insects found in the caves of Adelberg, in Styria, inhabited by 

 the Proteus. 



Another curious circumstance affecting a considerable number of species of different orders, has lately 

 formed the subject of numerous articles by different German writers, namely, the connexion which 

 exists between these insects and ants, in the nests of which they are generally found. Such has also 

 been found to be the case with the singular beetles forming the family Paussidse. 



Two papers by the Rev. F. W. Hope, upon insects which infest the interior of the human body, 

 and on the various species used as food by man, are worthy of notice in this place. 



The discovery of great numbers of fossil species of insects in different parts of Europe, has also 

 led to the publication of several works on this branch of the subject, especially Mr. Brodie's History 

 of the Fossil Insects, in the Secondary Rocks of England ; a paper by Dr. Germar, in the Nova 

 Acta, and a work by O. Heer on the Insects of CEningen ; and by Unger and Charpentier on those 

 of Radoboj in Croatia. Mr. Hope has also published a paper on fossil insects in Trans. Ent. Soc. Lon- 

 don, Vol. IV 



