208 THE ENTOMOLOOTSt's RECORD. 



bable habit of it^; lavva of leaviu^■ the tree and pupating elsewhere, 

 remind me that last September I found a freshly formed cocoon of 

 C. viaula upon a stone in a loosely-built stone wall. There were 

 aspen trees close by. There was next to no lichen upon the stone, so 

 the cocoon was simply formed of the glutinous substance. In colour 

 it was somewhat grey, like the stone. When removed from the latter, 

 there Avas hardly any perceptible mark left. The stone appeared to 

 have been proof against the jaws of the larva. — W. M. Christy, 

 F.E.S., Watergate, Emsworth. Ihremher 2'6rd, 1895. 



A DIFFICULTY MET WITH IN BREEDING SeSIA SPHEGIFORMIS. In the 



summer I bred a few specimens of SeHia sphcj/iformvi. Several of the 

 pupfe dropped out of the burrows, when they were obtruded for 

 emergence. It has been my constant experience that under such 

 circumstances the imagines fail to emerge without immediate manual 

 assistance. Possibly this dropping out is caused by the shrinking of 

 the alder stick, causing a disturbance of the ordinary conditions under 

 which emergence takes place, and that, without the natural leverage, 

 the imago cannot get rid of the pupal skin. It is, I should think, very 

 improbable that any pup;^ will be lost in this way in a state of nature. — 

 T. W. H.\LL, F.E.S., Stanhope, The Crescent, Croydon. December, 

 1895. 



On THE eggs and egglaying of Epinephele janira and Hipparchia 

 semele. — ^Does K/iinepJiele janira scatter her eggs loosely over grass 

 as she flutters about (G. F. Mathew), or do the females deposit their 

 eggs on various species of grass (Newman) ? I should be very 

 thankful for any reliable observations on the egg of this species, 

 which Riihl describes as : — " Kugelig, weisslich, mit Liingsleisten, 

 oberhalb schuppig, mit gewellten dunkleren Querbinden." This is 

 the only published description I can find. The only one available 

 of HipparrJn'a sewele, is " Ei gerippt, gelblich Weiss." Has any British 

 entomologist descriptions of these eggs ? — J. W. Tutt. 



.SOCIETIES. 



City of London Extonological and Natural History Society. — 

 December 17th, 1895. — Exhibits : — -Eev. C. R. N, Burrows : a 

 specimen of Chariclea umbra infested by a hair-worm {(iordius 

 rfYHrtf/V;(.s), a creature parasitic on Crustacea, fish and insects (both landand 

 water) at various stages of its existence ; also a preserved larva of I'tilo- 

 pliora pliunhjera, showing a bifurcated structure on the second segment 

 in a corresponding position to that occupied by the transverse slit in 

 THcranura rinula, through which the larva ejects an acrid fluid when 

 annoyed ; this was retracted when the larva was quiescent. Mr. 

 Tutt said that this structure was popularly known as the " chin gland," 

 and was very common in larvae belonging to very divergent groups of 

 the Lepidoptera. He suggested that it was probably of service in 

 protecting the larva from its enemies, and he suggested the possibility 

 of its having once been more distinctly functionally active than it 

 appeared to be at the present time. Mr. Mera : a specimen of 

 Saturnia pavnnia, which was principally female, but the wings on the 

 left side were shaped and coloured like male wings, though somewhat 

 paler; the right wings were just tinged here and there with male 

 coloration, and the left antenna was decidedly more pectinated than the 



