320 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



known to be viviparous; and it is possible that, while the 

 asparagus beetle usually lays eggs, the development of the 

 young may be so accelerated within the parent that the 

 young are born alive. 



The Colorado potato -beetle {Lepthiotarsa decemlineata) 

 lias been not only introduced into Bremen, but Nature re- 

 cords its occurrence in a field near Cologne in every stage 

 of development. In the United States it now occurs in 

 abundance as far east as the Kennebec River, Maine. 



Some entomological papers of importance appear in the 

 last Berlin Entomologisclie Zeitschrift, especially certain 

 notes on deformities in insects, mostly beetles. In 1875, 

 IT. Mocquerys published an account of twenty such cases 

 among beetles. 



The so-called "educated fleas" form the subject of a paper 

 in the American Naturalist by Mr. W. IT. Dall, who states, 

 after an examination of these entomological curiosities, that, 

 in the first place, the fleas are not educated ; and, in the sec- 

 ond place, "all the performances which make up the exhibi- 

 tion may be traced directly to the desire and earnest efforts 

 of the insects to escape." He explains the manner in which, 

 on the second hypothesis, the different tricks of these " un- 

 conscious automata" are performed. 



A synopsis of the two-winged gall-flies (Cecidomyiadce), 

 by Messrs. Bergenstamm and Low, of Vienna, appears in the 

 Transactions of the Zoological and Botanical Society of 

 Vienna. It seems, from the numerous citations of German 

 writers, that the Hessian fly is common in various parts of 

 Europe, and is probably indigenous. 



For two years past M. Victor Signoret, of Paris, has been 

 publishing, in the Annals of the Entomological Society of 

 France; a series of essays on the cochineal insect, as well as 

 all the different species of bark-lice (Coccidce). The eighti- 

 eth and last part has now been completed, and will proba- 

 bly be published in book form. 



The anatomy and histology of the Aphides and bark-lice 

 form the subject of an inaugural dissertation for the degree 

 of Ph.D. in the University of Leipsic, by E. L. Mark, of Ham- 

 let, N. Y. 



The nervous system of the Ilumoioptera (bees, wasps, 

 ants, sawflies, etc.) has been studied by E.Brandt. He do- 



