274 [December, 



depend merely on the existence in B. M. of examples supposed to have 

 been taken by Leach in Devonshire. 



That Leach himself was ever mistaken as to the origin of specimens 

 l)laced by him in the Museum, Smith has never suggested ; he speaks 

 only of an "accident" subsequent to Leach's death. But having lately 

 had special oppoi'tunities for studying the Museum Collections, I am very 

 much inclined to think that some of Leach's own statements as to insects 

 placed by himself in the Collection, and still there, are similarly due to 

 "accidents" occurring long before his death in 1836. For instance, 

 I simply cannot believe that he really took tioo species of Tar pa 

 {= 3Ie(/alodontes) in England, though he recorded them, giving a 

 British locality for each, in 1817, and jilaced a pair of each as " British " 

 in the Museum, where they still exist. The " Old Registers " of B. M. 

 show that Leach received a great man^^ German Lyclini from Klug, and 

 I strongly suspect that the above specimens really reached him in the 

 same way, and that he misinterpreted some note in his diar}- of captures 

 as though it referred to them. Now that the range of most Palaearctic 

 sawfly species and genera is better understood, and the discovery of a 

 hew British insect is something of an event, such a mistake would be 

 unlikely to occur. But Leach was constanth^ discovering new genera 

 and species in Britain ; and he would have no reason to think it a priori 

 unlikel}' that he should have met with a Megnlodontes in England. 



Again, it is on record that Leach himself collected on the Continent, 

 and especially in South France and the Riviera. Smith tells us that 

 he has ascertained that a certain Chrysid in the B. M. Coll. was 

 " taken in South France by Dr. Leach." It was " in the neighbourhood 

 of Nice " that he first discovered the n. sp. Chrysis leachii Shuck." ; and 

 he described " Thirteen species of Formicidae " from that district more 

 than ten years before his death (viz. in 1825). Now I find in the B. M. 

 " British Collection " specimens, standing as British, of the following 

 Aculeates and Chrysids, all of which, from their apparent age and 

 general appearance, might well be Leachian specimens ; some actually 

 ticketed with numbers such as he employed in registering Museum speci- 

 mens, while none are so marked as to suggest that they came from any 

 other source ; and all (NoTA bene !) characteristic members of the West 

 Mediterranean fauna, such as any collector might expect to meet with in 

 the district where it is known that Leach collected, Avhile not one of 

 them is believed to have occurred, or to be likel}^ to occur (unless 

 possibly by importation) in any parts of the British Islands : — 



Bees : Prosojjis variegata and hifasciata ; Sphecocles fascipennis; 

 Ceratina callosa (wrongly identified by Smith as a var. of 



