CURRENT NOTES. 43 



So much the worse for them, I say ! But 1 take it that Mi. Bethune- 

 Baker is on our side, if he were not be would scarcely be wasting time 

 upon a useless job. 



This investigation appeals naturally, at present, to a limited 

 number of Entomologists. Is it not quite possible that the two 

 Publishers expected to dispose of the twenty copies of Mr. Pierce's 

 book? 



May I, in conclusion, suggest to Mr. Bethune-Baker that he 

 mount, in his profile position, specimens of, ej/., an Kupithecia, 

 Mt'laniiipe /trucdlata, Blncosiiiia certata, CoUix aparmta, or lilapta hiiiiacn- 

 lata — photograph them, and publish the result with las explanation. 



(CURRENT NOTES AND SHORT NOTICES. 



The December Magazines contain the following : — 



In the Kui. Mo. Ma;/. Mr. E. A. Butler announces an addition 

 to the British List of Hemiptera, Lynus rubicnndu^, taken by Mr. H. 

 F. Fryer by sweeping in a ditch of mixed herbage in Cambridgeshire. 



On January 20th, the Annual Meeting of the Entomological 

 Society of London took place. Mr. G. T. Bethune-Baker, F.L.S., the 

 President, for the past two years, completed his term of office and read 

 the Annual Address. The subject was " The Development of Clasping 

 Organs in Insects,"' and was illustrated with a \evy large number of 

 lantern slides, some 90 or more of which have been reproduced on 

 twelve half-tone plates, to be issued with the Transactions. Com- 

 mencing with the consideration of the characteristics of the genitalia 

 of the Thysanura, the address went on to discuss these organs in the 

 Orthoptera, the Odonata, the Trichoptera and the Coleoptera. The 

 Lepidoptera Heterocera were next dealt with, the Micropteri/gidae, the 

 IJepialidar, the ConHidae, the Anthroceridae (Ziji/aenidae), the L'sj/cliidae, 

 the Aetjeriidae, the Drcpanulidae, the Lithosiinae, the Arctiinae, and 

 the Nolodotdidai', in more or less detail. The Lymantriidae, the 

 Laaincatiipidae, and the Satitrniidae, came next with a few (jeoiiictyldae. 

 Consideration was then given to the various families of the Diptera, a 

 few Hymenoptera and one or two species of ant. This paper will be 

 a very useful introduction to a study of the ancillary appendages of 

 other orders in comparison with those of the Lepidoptera, illustrated 

 as it will be by twelve plates, with figures nearly all in profile and thus 

 more useful to the ordinary worker, who wants readily and easily to 

 grasp the signij&cance of the various developments of those organs. 



The last issue of the " Transactions of the Entomological Society 

 of London " contains but four papers. (1) Description of South 

 American ]\Iicro-Lepidoptera, by Edward Meyrick, B.A., F.E.S. ; (2) 

 A contribution to the Life-History of Ayriaden thersites, by T. A. Chap- 

 man, ]\I.D., illustrated by twenty-eight plates, two of which are 

 coloured ; (3) On a new form of seasonal (and heterogeneutic) 

 dimorphism in Ayriades thersites, by T. A. Chapnum, M.D., with one 

 plate ; and (4) Notes on the Taxonomic value of Genital Armature in 

 Lepidoptera, by G. T. Bethune-Baker, F.L.S., with eleven plates. In 

 addition there are 82 pages of interesting matter concerning the 

 exhibits and discussions which took place at the ordinary meetings of 

 the Society. 



