4-70 Short Communications : — 



been submitted, has little doubt that the insect is Anobium 

 striatum, or the nearly allied species A. nitidum of Herbst., 

 {StepL III. M. iii. 340.) Of the Anobium tessellatum jP«5r., 

 and Termes pulsatorius Lin., both alluded to above, a fuller, 

 and of the Termes a very interesting, account, will be found 

 in our II. 461. Mr. Westwood, besides communicating the 

 name of our correspondent's insect, has favoured us with the 

 following remarks on death-watches generally.] 



As to the identity of the death-watch, it is to be observed, 

 that more than one insect is thus designated : the name, in 

 fact, being a generic rather than a specific one ; any unusual 

 ticking being called the death-watch. The noise, however, 

 made by the A'tropo5 lignarius is not near so loud as that of 

 the Anobium. One species of this genus, A. striatum, bores 

 into the painted wooden chimney-board of my study. The 

 perfect insects appear, in the hottest part of the summer, flying 

 about the room in search of their mates ; but for many weeks 

 previous to the appearance of the beetles, I hear the ticking 

 in the interior of the chimney-board; and as it is most pro- 

 bable that these insects lie but a very short time in the pupa 

 state, I cannot help thinking that this noise is caused by the 

 larva in gnawing the wood with its powerful jaws. The 

 females, after impregnation, must deposit their eggs either by 

 boring into the wood with their ovipositor, or they probably 

 creep into some of the old holes made on their exclusion, and 

 so get into the wood without any trouble. 



P. S. A confirmation of my supposition occurs whilst I am 

 writing (Oct. 13.), as I hear the ticking in the chimney-board 

 precisely similar to what I heard some months ago, although 

 it ,is some weeks since I saw a beetle ; so that, as there has 

 been sufficient time for the eggs deposited by the females to 

 be hatched, and for the grubs to acquire a moderate size, I 

 have little hesitation in laying it to the latter. — J. O. West- 

 wood, The Grove, Hammersmith. 



Addenda to my former Note about the Ticking of Anobium. — 

 In corroboration of my opinion that the ticking of the death- 

 watch is occasionally caused by the gnawing of the wood by 

 the larva, I may mention that I have continued to hear the 

 noise in the wood of my chimney-board up to the middle of 

 November. I find, moreover, that the celebrated French 

 entomologist, Olivier (in opposition to Geoffi'oy, who sup- 

 posed the noise was caused by the perfect beetle knocking a 

 dwelling-place for itself in the wood with its jaws), conjectured 

 that the larvae were the cause of the noise: he, however, 

 thought it was produced by the blows of the larvae in the 

 interior of the wood for the purpose of ascertaining the thick- 



