21S (September, 



the same general disposition to accept any species of Ax^hides offered, and also 

 the same cannibalistic tendency, for my batch of larvte were ultimately reduced 

 to one individual, which had presumably devovu-ed the rest. — E. Maude Alder- 

 son, Woi-ksop : A-uriust 16th, 1910. 



Iletiieujs. 



Catalogue of the Hbmiptera (Heteboptera), with biological and 

 anatomical references, lists of food plants and parasites, &c., vol. i, Cimicidse : 

 by G. W. KiBKALDY. Pp. xl and 392. Berlin : Felix L. Dames. 1909. 



This Catalogue will be welcomed by every Entomologist, no matter what 

 his own views on the subject of nomenclature may be. The geographical dis- 

 tribution of each species is given, as well as such food-plants, prey, parasites, 

 etc., as have been recorded ; the type of each genus is indicated ; the fossil 

 forms are included ; and much other valuable information, not usually to be 

 fotxnd in works of this kind, is interspersed through the various pages. In the 

 synonymy of the species the genus is quoted ivnder which each successive 

 author has placed it, these generic names being often entirely omitted by 

 cataloguers (as, for instance, in the Munich Catalogue of Coleoptera), thovigh 

 most useful to workers. The present Vohune, dated December 24th, 1909, on 

 the last page, the first of the estimated six or seven required, includes the 

 enumeration of the Family Cimicidse. (= Pentatomidse, Lethiei-ry and Severin 

 (part.), and extends to 392 pages, eight less than the estimated approximate total 

 of 400 required. The second Volume, treating of the Thyreocoridse, Vrolahididse, 

 AradidsB and Coreidee, is stated (on p. xl) to be in the press ; and the third, for 

 the Pyrrhocoridae, Myodochidx, and Tingidse, to be in active preparation. The 

 luitimely decease of the author on February 2nd, 1910, imder somewhat tragic 

 circvunstances, as a result of a surgical opei-ation at San Francisco, at the early 

 age of 36, renders the continuation of the scheme very doubtful, and we shall 

 probably have to be content with one vohune only. Kii-kaldy's views on 

 Nomenclatirre are given at great length (pp. x — xvii), under three headings .- 

 A, " Genera and Species ; " B, " Nomenclatm-e of groups of rank higher than 

 the genus;" C, "The fixation of genotypes." He also discusses the Classifica- 

 tion (pp. xxi — xxix). Bibliography (pp. xxiv — xxvi), &c. At the conclusion of 

 the Volume (pp. 383, 384) there is appended a list of the new names for genera, 

 species, and varieties proposed by him in the preceding pages ; a useful Table 

 of Contents (jj. 385) ; and an Index to the genera (pp. 385 — 392). The diffi- 

 culties of preparing such a Catalogue, and seeing it through the press, at such 

 a distance (he was a resident in the Hawaiian Is.) from the larger libraries, 

 will account for any minor errors in his citations, &c. One obvious slip may 

 be noted, a well-known beetle {Adimonia caprex) being given (p. 17) as a food- 

 plant of Zicrona cserulea. The Catalogue must have cost the author a vast 

 amount of labovu- for many years, and it is one that certainly ought to be in 

 the hands of every Entomologist, Hemipterist or otherwise. It shows what 

 can be done by one who really knows his subject, even if isolated in a 

 distant land. 



