1897.] 113 



known horny mass. If the acid was prevented from acting, as by supplying the 

 larvae witli bits of blotting paper soaked in an alkali to be utilized in making the 

 cocoon, the silk thus protected from the action of the acid retained its usual fibrous 

 structure. Sir George Harapson communicated a paper on " The Classification of 

 two sub-families of Moths of the Family Pi/ ralidce— the HydrocamplncB and <Sfo- 

 pariante." 



March 17fh, 1897.— The President in the Chair. 



Mr. Henry Hague, care of the Clydesdale Bank, 30, Lombard Street, E.C., was 

 elected a Fellow of the Society. 



Mr. Butterfield, present as a visitor, exiiibited a series of thirty-three male and 

 six female Phigalia pedaria, taken near Bradford, Yorkshire, on February 14th to 

 17th, 1897. Twenty-one males were typical in having a greater or less development 

 of transverse bars. The remaining twelve were without bands, and varied in colour 

 from black to smoky-olive ; they were decidedly less in point of size, ranging from 

 l-j^j' i"^- to 1^-^ in., as against 1~ in. to l^i in. in the banded forms, and were also 

 poorer in scales and slightly deformed. He had only met with this variety once 

 before in the last twenty years, and suggested that the eruption of small, black, and 

 depauperized forms might have been produced by dryness and want of food in the 

 larval conditions, the trees having been extensively defoliated in the preceding year. 

 Mr. Tutt agreed with this view, in the course of the subsequent discussion. Mr. 

 Porritt said that the melanic variety had occurred to his knowledge for several years 

 in the Bradford district, and that similar varieties, e. g., in A. hetularia, showed no 

 signs of depauperisation. Mr. Kirkaldy exhibited an example of the rare macro- 

 pterous form of Velia currens, Fabr., taken at East Grrinstead, and one of Cicadetta 

 montana, Scop., from Brockenhurst. Mr. Burr exhibited a series of grasshoppers 

 with red and blue hind-wings of the Family (EdipodidcB, to show the remarkable 

 variation in colour seen in this group. Red, blue, and yellow forms are found alike 

 in the same species, the blue being due to the failure of the red pigment, and 

 therefore an incipient albinism, the yellow being a further form of albinism. Mr. 

 Champion communicated a paper on the Elaterida and Rhlpidoceridce collected 

 by Mr. H. H. Smith, at St. Vincent, Grenada, and the Grenadines, and exhibited 

 the specimens. Dr. Forel also communicated a paper on the Formicida, collected 

 by Mr. Smith in the same islands. — W. F. H. Blandfoed and F. Meeeifielo, 

 Hon. Sees. 



April 7th, 1897.— The President in the Chair. 



The following Memorandum of an Association for the Protection of Insects in 

 danger of extermination, which had been drawn up by a Committee appointed for 

 the purpose and approved by the Council, was laid before the Society and signed 

 generally by those present : " We, the undersigned, being desirous of protecting 

 from extermination those rare and local species of Insects which are not injurious to 

 Agriculture nor to Manufactures, do hereby agree, by our own example and by the 

 exercise of our influence over others, to discourage the excessive collection and 

 destruction of those species of Insects which from their peculiar habits are in danger 

 of extermination in the United Kingdom. 



"We further agree to accc))t for the purposes of this Association such list o-f 



K 



