Vol. Xxiv] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 83 



He also says that Lycaena actnon of both sexes was flying at the same 

 time, not only at this locality but everywhere else. It seems that the 

 Californian Lepidopterists, including Mr. Wright have taken neitrona 

 to be merely a variety of acmon female. Mr. Newcomb did not share 

 this opinion and sent me a male specimen for examination. In the 

 original lot from Doble there are three males and two females and I 

 also have a female from Pine Mountain Forest Reserve, Ventura Coun- 

 ty, California. Acmon with which the species has been confused, has 

 sexes unlike (antigenetic), while in neurona there are no secondary 

 sexual characters. It is a smaller species than acmon and may be 

 known by the orange colored neuration which is relatively variable in 

 different specimens. HENRY SKINNER. 



Birds & Butterflies (Lepid.) 



During the rainy season in South Africa, the open glades in the 

 forests bordering the rivers are gay with multitudes of brightly col- 

 ored butterflies of many different species and after a night's rain but- 

 terflies of various kinds may often be seen settling in masses around 

 pools of water along wagon roads. Most of these are conspicuously 

 colored, though they are in perfect harmony with the sunlit flowers 

 which spring up at the time of year when they appear. I cannot, how- 

 ever, believe that the need for protection against birds or other ene- 

 mies has anything to do with the determination of their various col- 

 ors, as in all my experience (and I have all my life been a close ob- 

 server of nature) I have never once seen a bird feeding upon butter- 

 flies in Africa. African Nature Notes and Reminiscences, by FREDER- 

 ICK COURTENEY SELOUS, F. Z. S. 



Insect Arrow Poison (Coleop.) 



Bushmen in Africa. Their bows are very small and weak looking 

 and their arrows are unfeathered, being of light reeds into the ends 

 of which bone heads are inserted. These bone arrow heads are al- 

 ways thickly smeared with poison, which seems to be made from the 

 body of a grub* or caterpillar mixed with gum. At least, in the bark 

 quivers of the Bushmen whose belongings I have examined. I have 

 usually found, besides their arrows and fire sticks, a small bark cylin- 

 der closed at one end, in which were the bodies of grubs or cater- 

 pillars preserved in gum, which I was told contained the poison they 

 smeared on their arrows. Ibid. SELOUS. 



*Perhaps the larva of the Chrysomelid Diamphidia locusta; see 

 Wellman, ENT. NEWS, XIX, p. 229, also v. Fiirth, Vergl. chem. Physiol. 

 d. niederen Tiere, 1903, p. 365. Ep. 



