78 THE entomologist's record. 



limit, and the farmer has not been benefitted. If he desires to save his 

 crop, he must himself adopt measures for the destruction of these 

 insects: parasites will not helj) him in the least." With this wise and 

 logical deduction we will leave the paper. 



Another paper, on " Mosquitoes," by J. Alston Moffat, of Loudon, 

 Ontario, is most interesting and instructive. He says in the course of 

 it : — " Travellers have recorded their experience with mosquitoes in all 

 parts of the world ; some declaring that those of the Arctic regions are 

 the worst they ever encountered, but South America, from its climatic 

 condition and its low-lying lands, which are frequently flooded, is in a 

 position to carry off the prize against the world for its crop of mosquitoes 

 and that the early travellers there were duly impressed with this fact 

 is evidenced by the names given to places, such as Mosquito Coast, 

 Mosquito Bay and Mosquito Town. In ancient history we read of 

 armies on the march being arrested on the way and made to beat a 

 hasty retreat from the attack of these tiny warriors, which is quite 

 believable ; for if we take into consideration tlie scant and loose cover- 

 ing which they probably wore, which gave the wearers so much more 

 space to defend, they were not in a condition to jjursue human foes, 

 when every man of them was engaged in a double-handed conflict witli 

 such pertinacious insect enemies." 



We had almost overlooked one of the most important papers. It is 

 on piire entomology, and entitled "A contrasted summary of the main 

 external Characters of Butterflies in their different stages of life," by 

 Dr. Scudder. It is in tabular form, and were it not for want of space, 

 we would reproduce it here, but we have no doubt most of our more 

 advanced readers will get it for themselves. 



It is impossible to go further into this readable volume, but there is 

 one thing we should like to })oint out and that is that of 1,761 dollars 

 received by the Society, no less than 1,000 dollars was in the shape of 

 Government grant. Our colony is, therefore, far ahead of us as regards 

 the public interest taken by the Government in entomological work. 

 Many of the articles are purely economic, others are descrij^tive ; but 

 the advantage to agriculturists of such an annual volume which, we 

 believe, the Government distributes broadcast, must be incalculable, as 

 much in leading their powers of observation in the right direction as in 

 the direct information given in its pages. We have no doubt that the 

 secretaries of our Societies could get copies annually in return for their 

 own Tranmctions ; at any rate it should be considered a part of the duty 

 of the larger Societies to provide their members with a copy. J. Alston 

 Moffat, Es(i., Ent. Soc. of Ontario, Victoria Hall, London, Ontario, would, 

 no doubt, arrange such an exchange. 



New Mexico College of Agricidtnre, Bulletin 10, Sei)tember, 1893.— 

 Las Cruces, whither Prof. Cockerell has recently gone as one of the 

 State Entomologists, gives us this, and the insect portion is written by 

 our esteemed correspondent. Four of our British si)ecies of lepidoptera 

 come in for notice: — Vanessa antiojia, an imago seen on August 5th, 

 whilst a brood of larvse were taken on the same day feeding on willow. 

 Carpocupsa pomonella ; apples offered for sale in Las Cruces were 

 observed to be badly infested. HeJiothis armiyer (the corn-worm), the 

 larvfBof which were found on August IGth, living in the sheaths of tlie 

 young leaves of corn at the College Farm. It is yellowish-grey with 

 short almost invisible hairs springing from small blackish tubercles ; 



