THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 211 



price 12.S. ; for collecting and preserving only, Greene's 

 ' Insect Hunter's Companion,' ])rice Is. 6d. There are a great 

 many others, but they are eillier profound and learned books, 

 unintelligible to beginners, or ])leasant compilations by authors 

 who have little or no jjractical acquaintance with the subject. 

 The above three books arc published by Mr. Van Voorst, and 

 have been prepared especially to supply a want felt by all 

 learners. — Edward Netv>7ian.] 



C. Le Merle Adivns. — Palpi (or feelers) — organs attached 

 to the jaws of insects; ciliated — fringed with a series of 

 parallel hairs; pectinafed — furnished on one side with a 

 number of stiff parallel branches resembling the teeth of a 

 comb; costal — near or on the upper edge of the wing; 

 reniform — kidney-shaped ; discoidal — in the middle of the 

 wing, not near its margin ; orbicular — round ; glabrous — 

 smooth and shining; dorsal — on the back or upper surface; 

 isdbelline — the colour of a fawn ; lateral — on the side ; 

 reticulations — fine marks like net-work. For explanations of 

 this kind I may also refer to the books recommended in 

 the previous note. There is no English work containing 

 illustrations of most of the Lepidopterous larvae. — Edward 

 Newman. 



TJiomas Eedle and others. — I believe the nests sent this 

 summer from Scotland to be those of Vespa sylvestris of 

 Scopoli (' Sp. Tnsectorum,' vol. i. p. 460). I have particularly 

 examined the series of perfect insects, males and workers, 

 just brought by Mr. Eedle on his return from Rannoch. 

 Entomologists, who are desirous of studying the species of 

 British wasps, would do well to take the entire nest and all 

 its contents, and, after having allowed the cyanide to do its 

 work, to set and preserve every specimen, labelling them and 

 their nests with a similar number, and not introducing a 

 single specimen that was not actually killed in the nest. 

 Mr. F. Smith, of the British Museum, and subsequently 

 Dr. Ormerod, of Brighton, have laboured industriously to 

 make the species intelligible : the discriminative remarks of 

 the former, and the figures of the last-named author, are most 

 praiseworthy. 'l"he difficulty of the subject, however, is very 

 manifest, from the conllicting synonymy in Mr. Smith's own 

 various papers. An unmistakable figure of the nest of this 

 wasp will be found on plate vi. of Dr. Ormerod's ' British 



