1912.] 139 



A note on Xenolechia scalella, Sc. — This beavitii'iil little moth is just 

 beginning to appear on the oak trunks ; twenty years ago it was quite common on 

 certain oaks here, but it seems to get less common eveiy year. — A. Thubnall. 



Triogma trisulcata, Schiim., in Perthshire. — When I introduced this fly to 

 the British List in the April iivimber of this Magazine {ante, p. 84), I had no 

 expectation of taking it here — almost at my own door, and so soon after writing 

 my note. It is with pleasure, therefore, that I record five specimens taken to-day 

 on a marshy piece of ground lying just outside this town. This particular spot 

 has yielded me several "good things," of which the present species is one of the 

 most interesting. All the sijecimens are males, and were found flying low down 

 over moss and short vegetation growing in water. I hope to get the ? , and 

 perhaps the larva. The latter is not known with certainty, but the supposed 

 larva has been described by de Rossi (Entom. Nachr, 1876, p. 31). His larva 

 resembled in a general way the larva of Phalocrocera, which has been so well 

 described by Prof. Miall. All my specimens show a faint dorsal abdominal 

 stripe. — A. E. J. Carter, Blairgowrie : May 8th, 1912. 



Jlcuieu;. 



Genera Insectorum, Ease. 122nd, Dermaptera By Malcolm Burr, D.Sc. 

 112 pp., 8 coloured and 1 uncolovu-ed Plates. Wytsman, Brussels, 1911. 

 Pi'ice fr. 44. 



The appearance of this memoir must be hailed with satisfaction by every 

 entomologist, for at last we liave in oiu- hands a comprehensive and authoritative 

 accoiint of a most ditReult and much neglected group of insects. Until the publi- 

 cation of Dr. Burr's volume on the earwigs of India, these insects had never been 

 really satisfactorily figiired except in a few isolated descriptive papers and 

 faunistic works. The magnificent plates, the work of the accomplished 

 Mr. Edwin Wilson of Cambridge, which accompany the text of Dr. Burr's latest 

 monograph, give a good idea of the remarkable diversity of form and coloration 

 existing in the Dermaptera, whilst the niunerous outline drawings of anatomical 

 details must be of enormous service in ekicidating the text, clear though this 

 is. Dr. Burr has devoted many years to the study of the Dermaptera, and during 

 that time a steady stream of descriptive papers has poured from his prolific pen. 

 Some measure of his industry can ha gained from a consideration of the fact 

 that out of the 143 genera enumerated in this memoir, 76 owe their origin to him. 

 But the author has done more than publish descriptions of new genera and new 

 species, for he has thoroughly revised the classification of the families into 

 which the Dermaptera are divided, and has reduced to order the chaos in which 

 the group had been left by De Bormans and Krauss. In his introduction. 

 Dr. Burr adequately acknowledges the labom-s of Verhoeft' and Zacher in tlie 

 vineyard, which he might almost call his own, and has succeeded in dovetailing 

 their conclusions with his own in a most ingenious manner. It speaks well for 



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