SOCIETIES. 43 



furnished rooms possible to imagine, and if members do not pick up 

 something amusing (of course, from the point of view looked at), 

 and instructive at every meeting, it is certainly their own fault. The 

 new President, Mr. C. G. Barrett, a most impartial member and excel- 

 lent lepidopterist, was elected by acclamation, and it was no surprise 

 that Messrs. Tugwell, Frohawk, Billups and Fenn got almost every 

 possible vote they could in the ballot for Council. The Society re- 

 elected all the permanent officers, and is to be congratulated on 

 knowing when it is well served. That the Society may have a pros- 

 perous year is the earnest wish of every one connected wiih it ! — Ed. 



Lancashire and Cheshire Society. — President's (S. J. Capper) 

 Address. — I must ask your indulgence on the present occasion if my 

 remarks to-night partake more of a fraternal conversation than of a 

 Presidential Address. I am induced to do this for several reasons. In 

 the first place, I have already given fourteen annual addresses, and, on 

 referring to these, find that they all, to a greater or less extent, follow 

 the same procedure, viz. : — (i) A retrospective review of entomological 

 work accomplished in the previous year. (2) The special work achieved 

 by our Society. (3) Economic entomology, etc. Perhaps this is the 

 kind of address expected from a President, and I know some of our 

 members look forward to this. One, indeed, on a former occasion, 

 flattered me very much by saying he anticipated, in these addresses, to 

 be posted up in entomological events in the same way as he looked to 

 " Whitaker's Almanack " for general information. Mr. Tutt, in the 

 Eiitomologhfs -Record, a periodical which I hope all present support, and 

 which ought to be read by every entomologist, has, in the December 

 number of last year, given a most exhaustive and interesting article 

 called "The Retrospect of a Lepidopterist for 1891." This he has done 

 so thoroughly that I feel all my past records to have been only feeble 

 attempts in comparison, and that, on the present occasion, I could make 

 no addition to the information he has already given respecting my own 

 special order — the Lepidoptera. I therefore recommend Mr. Tutt's 

 article for perusal to all interested in this matter, and I shall be much 

 gratified if, in so doing, you are at all reminded of your President's 

 addresses in the past. It may be interesting to note the following 

 remarks. Mr. Tutt states "that, from a collector's point of view, the 

 season all round has been a good one for the lepidopterist ; that while 

 the Kent collectors and the Scotch collectors have made bitter complaints 

 of the paucity of lepidoptera, there has been a good record from other 

 localities." As regards myself, I never remember the appearance of so 

 many rarities — Polyoinmatus virgaurcea, Deilephila livornica, Sesia 

 formiciformis, S. sphegiforinis, S. scoliceforviis, Lithosia sericea, L. caiiiola, 

 Callimorpha hera, Cy matophora ocularis, Cuspidia sirigosa, C. alni, 

 Leucaiiia albipiuicta, Nonagria concolor, Pachetra leucophaa, Apainea 

 ophiogramma, Dianthcecia barrellii, Hadena satiira, Plusia moneta, 

 Phorodesma smaragdaria, Eiipithccia exiensaria, Cidaria reticulata, 

 Botys lupulinalis, Phycis hostilis, Cra?/ibus niyellus, etc. The above is a 

 good record of rarities for one year. My own idea is that very few, if 

 any, of the lepidoptera are really rare, but that it is only from our 

 ignorance of their life histories that to us they appear so. Mr. Tugwell's 

 experience with Sesia sphegiformis this past summer, shows how much 

 may be done by "Assembling." At the last meeting of the South 



