l6o ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [May, '02 



we do still have the voluntary assistant with us. He writes under date of 

 April gth, 1902, as follows: "Dear Sir: As I red in your Experiment 

 Station about a Man wanting ten thousand Dollars to kil those Miskatoes 

 Now if you will take and fill a barrel half full of water in hot weather and 

 let it stand till it stagnated and then take your glasses and look careful 

 in the water and you will see the Logerhead those turns to Muskatoes 

 after a few days you can see them crawling up the barrel. If that Man 

 will stop its raining so there is no stagnated water, I think their would be 

 No Musketoes." The advice is good, no doubt; but there is just a little 

 difficulty in getting it carried out ! J. B. SMITH. 



Sphyracephala brevicornis SAY. In the January NEWS, in the report 

 of the meeting on November 2istof the Entomological Section of the 

 Academy of Natural Sciences, I noticed a reference to this species, or 

 the "hammer-headed fly," as it is sometimes termed here, and the state- 

 ment that Ithaca is a "locality with no skunk cabbage nearby." Evident- 

 ly Mr. Huntingdon was misinformed in regard to this, for there is cer- 

 tainly an abundance of Symptocarpus here, even within the city limits. 

 The "Renwick flats" are thickly covered in places with skunk cabbage, 

 and there is also a good supply of it in places along Fall Creek. How- 

 ever, one often takes these peculiar little flies at some distances from the 

 skunk cabbage tracts. This last summer scores of them were swept from 

 bushes and herbage along Fall Creek, down near the water, at points 

 where there was none of this plant to be seen, but there was an abundance 

 of it to be found higher up on the banks, at the top of the gorge. C. O. 

 HOUGHTON. 



THE SHARON SUMMER SCHOOL, conducted by the Instructing Staff of 

 the Biological Department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 

 will have a centre for outdoor work at the Sharon Biological Observatory, 

 Sharon, Mass. Various courses will be given including Entomology. 

 Opens July gth and extends over four months. Fees $30, payable in ad- 

 vance. For particulars, address C. E. A. Winslow, Mass. Inst. Tech- 

 nology at Boston. 



PRIZES FOR COLLECTIONS OF BEETLES. In pursuing its purpose to 

 encourage the study of local natural history the Science Museum of 

 Springfield, Mass., offers two cash prizes for the collection of beetles. 

 These prizes are open to children who are pupils below High School 

 grade in any Springfield school. The prizes will be one of ten dollars 

 and one of five dollars for the two best collections. 



FOURTH ANNUAL SESSION, UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA BIOLOGICAL 

 STATION, Flathead Lake, Montana. A field and laboratory comsf in 

 Entomology will be given. Instruction in collecting, preserving and label- 

 ling insects; dissection and. study of typical specimens. The facilities for 

 excursions and collecting are excellent and the country interesting and 

 beautiful. Begins July i4th. No fees. Board $5.00 per week. For in- 

 formation apply to Prof. M. J. Elrod, Missoula, Montana. 



