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Selecte& Motce front tbe Socict^'6 



mote^Boofte. 



To Mount Insects without Pressure.— Mr. Stani forth Green, of 

 Ceylon, is a great proficient at this style of mounting. The 

 accompanying slide of Head of Blow-Fly shows the internal 

 structure, and also the proboscis in its natural position. The 

 method of treatment is to kill the insect in turpentine, which is 

 afterwards heated, causing the protrusion of tongue and oviposi- 

 tor and the expulsion of air from the spiracles. The insect is 

 left in the turpentine for any length of time that may be required 

 to produce the necessary transparency, and mounted in balsam 

 without pressure. Small insects, such as gnats, do not require the 

 turpentine to be heated, and for these camphine is to be preferred. 

 If it is required to arrange the legs, etc , this should be done very 

 soon after the insect is killed, as it soon becomes, rigid. 



J. E. Ingpen. 



Coccus cataphractus (" armed at all points " ) (PL XIX., Figs. 

 I, 2, 3). — The Mailed Coccus was found in wet moss. When 

 living, it has a beautiful ivory-white appearance, suggestive of 

 relationship with the Wood-lice, the little crustaceans found 

 among decayed wood. I think it is not very common, as no one 

 appeared to know them. But they are figured and described in 

 Shaw's Zoology, 181 7. I do not think they would be classed 

 with the Scale insects now. H. E. Freeman, 



Gomphonema germinatum is peculiar to streams in mountain" 

 ous countries. It is remarkable for the extreme development of 

 the stipes. The frustules are attached to the smaller of the two 

 knobbed ends, like flowers, to the summits of long, stout, tough, 

 branching filaments, which are matted together into sponge like 

 tufts an inch or more in diameter. H. F. Parsons. 



Fronds of Ferns. — I cannot understand why the leaves of 

 ferns should be commonly called "fronds." A frond, or " thallus," 

 is the term applied to the vegetative expansions of plants which 

 have no distinction between sfem and leaves^ as liverworts, lichens, 

 algse, etc. Ferns have distinct stems, and their leaves correspond 

 in structure to those of flowering plants. The leaves of plants 

 lower in the scale than Ferns, as Mosses and Jungermanni^e, are 

 always called " leaves," not " fronds." H. F. Parsons. 



Cuticle of Stangeria paradoxa.— I do not know this plant, but 

 I fancy it is one of the Cycadacece. The thick walls of the epi- 

 dermic cells are very curious. I notice that the stomatic cells do 



