VARIATION. Ill 



Variation of Oporabia dilutata. — For some time I have been 

 setting aside such specimens of (Jporabia dilutata as came in my way, 

 and I tind that most of the specimens that I have taken near Glasgow 

 are of a more or less unicolorous grey, the hind-wing being lighter 

 than the fore-wings, which have just a slight indication of marking, 

 although the bands in some specimens can be followed. I have a 

 number of specimens from the Paisley district which are rather 

 remarkable, reminding one of the specimens of lh/j)sij)('t('s sonlidata, 

 with a pale band across the centre of the wings, the remainder of the 

 wings being of a dark-grey colour, with the base lighter. I have a 

 few specimens from the high moorland ground (Lead Hills and Wen- 

 lochhead), which do not differ much from those taken in the lower 

 woodlands near Glasgow, except that there are a few dark (almost 

 black) markings along the costa, and extending inwards along the 

 central bands.— J. J. F. X. King, F.E.S., 207, Sauchiehall Street, 

 Glasgow. June, 1896. 



Oporabia dilutata is very common here (Castle Moreton) and can 

 sometimes be obtained in great abundance by beating the boughs of 

 trees during the daytime. Two forms (1) a dark grey, and (2) a pale 

 grey, with more distinct markings, are about equally abundant, 

 and I have also one specimen very pale indeed, and the markings more 

 distinct than in any other specimens. It approximates in markings 

 very closely to Plate III., fig. 1 {Ent. Pwr., vol. vii.).— (Rev.) E. C. 

 DoBREE Fox, M.A., Castle Moreton, Tewkesbury. June, 1896. 



dfURRENT NOTES. 



The "Power Collection" has been acquired by the Trustees of 

 the British Museum. It consists of about 30,000 specimens of 

 British Coleoptera, and about 5,000 specimens of Hemiptera. 



Mr. J. J. Walker, of 23, Eanelagh Road, Sheerness, on the 

 evening of May 14th, found, on the foreshore of the Isle of Sheppey, 

 a number of Fixjinms littoralin and P. lurid ipennia running rapidly over 

 the bare mud, or, wherever a little moisture was to be found, sitting in 

 vertical burrows about half-an-inch deep, each beetle with its head 

 just at the level of the soil, the earth being thrown out round the 

 mouth of the burrow in a granular form, as by a sandhopper or a 

 Bledius, only much more regularly. He has specimens of 1'. lurid i- 

 pennis to spare for friends {K.M.M.). 



Mr. Chitty records a specimen of Qucdius riparim, taken by him- 

 self in September, 1893, in flood refuse from the river Beauly, Inver- 

 ness, N.B., in the neighbourhood of Beauly Castle. 



Dr. Sharp {]<::. M.M.) states that the rudiments of the wings of the 

 butterfly can be found in the interior of the body of the caterpillar, 

 and Verson has recently stated that he has found them in the 

 embryo caterpillar some days before the young silkworm leaves the 

 egg, when it consists of a few cells in close propinquity with a 

 tracheal branch, placed on the interior of the wall of the body on the 

 second and third thoracic segments. Further growth develops a pro- 

 jection into the interior of the body, and as the cells increase the 

 tracheae multiply and assume a complex form, so that branches of 

 minute, rollcd-up, tracheal? are found in the wing-rudiments. When 

 the quiescent stage preceding pupation is reached, the wings disappear 

 from the interior of the body, and, if the outer layer of the cuticle 



