SCIENTIFIC NOTES. 



253 



It is not very easy to examine the non-chitinous portions of a ? 

 abdomen when this happens to be five years old, so, vv^hile I can 

 guarantee the existence of all that I saw, I cannot be sure that other 

 organs which I did not see were not present. To begin with the 

 abdomen itself, the segments are curiously mixed, several appear to be 

 continuous so that I am unable to count the full number found in a 

 female abdomen. Inside the abdomen is a long diaphragm which 

 separated the male and female organs. The ovaries were normal in size 

 and symmetrical, ova were present in oviduct, the receptaculum seminis 

 was clearly visible, but I could find no ductus seminalis, glands nor 

 other female organs. The male genitalia are complete but crippled ; 

 uncus shorter and thicker, processes of uncus normal ; harpes extremely 

 asymmetrical, one twice — at the extremity three times — as broad as the 

 other, both greatly crippled and in the same way, i.e., terminating in a 

 heavy club preceded by a narrow neck instead of the usual unbroken 

 line of the spindle-shaped harpe ; gedooagus regular but rather heavy ; 

 vesica and anus normal ; seminal duct normal, but I was unable to 

 trace it so far as the testes, which latter I was unable to discover. 



This is a curious case of genetic hermaphroditism. The germ-plasm 

 of both sexes is present, the primary sexual characters of both seem to 

 be fairly equally proportioned, but the secondary sexual characters of 

 the male have completely swamped — as Dr. Cockayne says — those of 

 the female. — P. A. H. Muschamp (F.E.S.), Stiifa, Lake Geneva. 

 October 25th, 1914. 



Copulation of P. atalanta in October. — Early in September I 

 captured ten Pyranteis atalanta (some of both sexes) and placed them 

 in cage for laying. This they refused to do. On October 7th I started 

 my hot house to force out some Manduca atropos pup®, and brought 

 the cage with P. atalanta into this house and placed it over the hot 

 water pipes. The heat in this house varies from 60° to 80°, seldom the 

 latter. The imagines were kept well fed, and on passing the cage on 

 October 12th I noticed a pair in cop. This was at 2-15 p.m. and they 

 parted at 4*30, the temperature at 2-15 in the house was 75°, and I 

 noticed it was not sunny. I shall try to carry these specimens through 

 the winter in the warm as I have done before. I thought this worth 

 recording as I believe little is known of the pairing of the species. 

 Since writing the above the female laid freely for two days, when I 

 took the nettle away to stop her depositing more. She seemed very 

 unhappy for a few days without food to lay on, but has now (October 

 22nd) settled down. 1 am in hopes of keeping her alive till the spring. 

 — L. W. Newman. Bexley, Kent. 



Lepidoptera pairing more than once. — As the question has some- 

 times been asked whether moths pair more than once, the following 

 notes may be of interest. 



On April 26th, 1914, two specimens of Ihepana falcataria were 

 seen paired in a cage at 11 a.m. They remained paired for several 

 hours but at 11 a.m. next morning they had separated and the male ' 

 was placed with another female. Within two hours he had paired 

 with the 2nd female and was still paired at 7.30 p.m. On the 28th, 

 at 1.40 a.m. he was free and lively, and though opportunity was given 

 he did not pair again. I regret that I did not ascertain whether the 

 ova laid by these females were fertile, nor even whether the 2nd 

 female laid ova. 



