NOTES ON APIIOMIA SOCIEM.A. 77 



I noticed, when they coinnioiiced to emerge, that males were in the 

 majorit}^ but during July just the reverse was the case, as during the 

 latter month 77 females appeared and only 18 males. Only two came 

 out cripples after the ftrst day, but on that day 12 of the 2() were 

 cripples, which I think I can account for by the fact that I had 

 neglected to damp the cluster for some days before. Not a single 

 Ichneumon appeared. The total number that emerged was 242 (112 

 females, 130 males), and this does not include a small bunch that I 

 sent to Mr. Kichard South, out of which he bred 20 males and only H 

 females. I watched the process of emergence on several occasions. 

 The insect struggled out of the cluster, and, when free, ran down the 

 side of the cluster and then rested on it, head upwards, until its wings 

 wore developed, which took but a short time. They commenced 

 emerging each day about 4 or 5 p.m., and continued to do so at in- 

 tervals till I went to bed, and in the morning when I came down I 

 usually found one or more had emerged during the night. I cannot 

 remember any emerging before the evening. As to the food on which 

 the larvfe fed, I know that in books we are told that they feed on the 

 wax found in the nests of Humble-bees; but why should they not 

 feed in the wasps' nests ? I ask this, because in the garden where 

 the cluster was dug up there were fourteen wasps' nests during the 

 summer of 1893 (at which time the larva3 would have been feeding) 

 and this makes me think that very probably they feed in wasps' as 

 well as in Humble-bees' nests. This is only my own idea, and, of 

 course, there might have been plenty of Humble-bees' nests in the 

 garden, though unobserved by the gardener. With these few remarks 

 I shall end, and only hope that my feeble efforts to explain, as far as 

 I know it by my recent experience, the life history of A socieUa will 

 interest some of the readers of this magazine. — Suaw House, Newbury, 

 Berks. Feb. \st, 1895. 



Qerieric JNlames iii the p^octuidae. 



By A, RADCLIFFE GROTE, A.M. 



(Continued from page 80). 



CosBiiA, Hiibn., 1806. — Type : C. affinis, Hiibn., Tent. Sole species, 

 and therefore type. 



Enakgia, Hiibn., 1816-18. — Type: E. palcacea. Sole sj^ecies, and 

 therefore type. Cahjmnia, Hiibn., Verz., appears to be a synonym of 

 Cosmia. With the type of Cosmia, Hiibner includes iraj)ezina, ap- 

 parently a congeneric species. Hiibner, in the Verzeichniss, distributes 

 the species referred by Ochsenheimer in 1816 to his genus Cosmia, 

 among the genera Enargia (paleacea), Calymnia {trapezina, afinis), and 

 Eustegnia (diffinis, pyralina). 



Helioscota, Grt., 1895. — Tyi)C : R. niisclioides. I take for the type 

 a well known sjjecies of Hadcna, Smith, Lederer partim, nee Schraiik. 

 Of Celaena the type is probably C. haworthii. Miana, Stejih., Oliijia, 

 Hiibn., and perhaps, CaUirrgis Hiibn., are applied to Lederer's and 

 Staudinger's section C, containing opiiiogramma and seciilis. Ilawvithii 

 seems distinct from the rest of Lederer's Liiperiiia, ncme of which are 

 contained originally (1829) in Liiperiiia,oi which genus I have not been 

 able yet to find the type. For Lnperina, Led. (excl. haworthii), the term 



