CURRENT NOTES. 43 



whom Mr. Verrall referred to as a hardworking and earnest student of 

 nature, and an ideal member of such a social body as the Entomo- 

 logical Club in its inception was intended to be. Not less did one 

 miss Mr. ]\Iartin Jacob}', who, through all these years, has added his 

 quota to the enjo3mient of the gatherings by his masterly skill on the 

 violin, and who had also died a brief three weeks before. Later, the 

 President of the Entomological Society, Mr. C. 0. Waterhouse, 

 proposed the health of "Our Host," which was responded to in the 

 most hearty manner. A very pleasant evening was spent, the 

 company not finally breaking up till close upon midnight. 



Mr. South has written in "The moths of the British Isles" 

 (Frederick Warne and Co., price 7s. 6d. net), a companion work to the 

 " Butterflies " noticed a few months ago. In one particular, this may 

 l)e really called a " companion " work, viz., in the excellence of its 

 illustrations, but, owing to the attempt to cover so much ground, the 

 letterpress concerning each species, accurate as far as it goes, falls 

 considerably short of that of the first volume, except in two 

 groups, viz., the Sphingids and Lachneids, which provide excellent 

 summaries of what has more recently been published on these well- 

 worked superfamilies. The letterpress of the Noctuids is very 

 meagre, but this evidently must not be laid to the author's door, as it is 

 a mere matter of attempting to get a quart into a pint pot, for which 

 one suspects he is in no wise responsible. Some of the wonderful 

 "English"! names are beyond us altogether, and we wonder how 

 many entomologists can tell us who " the Neglected or Grey Eustic," 

 " the Northern Rustic " and " the Crescent-striped " are. The excel- 

 lence of the plates will interest all lepidopterists, and we have no doubt 

 that the letterpress will also prove valuable to those beginners who are 

 sure to be attracted by so taking and cheap a volume. 



At the meeting of the Lancashire and Cheshire Entomological 

 Society, held December 16th, 1907, Mr. C. B. Williams exhibited a ? 

 example of the olive-banded ab. olivaceofasciata, of Lasiocanipa quercm, 

 bred m 1907, from a larva obtained at Wallasey. A full and detailed 

 account of the various specimens of this form, and those of the allied 

 ab. oliracea, taken in this country, is given in the Kat. Hist, of Brit. 

 Lep., iii., pp. 86-87. 



We have just read through two excellent recently-published books 

 which should, we think, be in the hands of all entomologists. The 

 first is by Professor Vernon L. Kellogg, and is entitled " Darwinism 

 to-day " (Henry Holt and Co., New York, U.S.A.), a discussion of 

 present-day scientific criticism of the Darwinian selection theories, 

 together with a brief account of the principal other proposed auxiliary 

 and alternative theories of species-forming. The other is by Professor 

 D. S. Jordan and Professor V. L. Kellogg, and is called "Evolution 

 and Animal Life " (D. Appleton and Co., New York, U.S.A.), an 

 elementary discussion of facts, processes, laws and theories relating to 

 the life and evolution of animals. Entomological material is largely 

 used in the discussion of many of the problems considered, and every 

 one interested in the general subject can read them with considerable 

 profit. The former is perhaps the more characteristic treatise, the latter 

 a first-class series of lectures, carefully edited and arranged for separate 

 publication in book form. 



Mr. Newbery describes {K.M.M.) a new beetle under the title, Laccobius 



