202 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



April, 1906) of the seriousness of which there can be, it is said, 

 no question : — *' Take the human seed- germs (spermatozoa), put 

 them upon a plate, first spreading some alkaline nourishment 

 upon the plate — for instance, a little soap ; place the plate in a 

 room of proper temperature, and in sixteen to twenty-four hours 

 swarms of ants will be running about. In other words, these 

 living human germs, placed under this different condition other 

 than the mother-soil, develop into ants. These little fellows can 

 be watched and be seen to gradually develop and start off on the 

 run. This would evidently appear that living germs, when 

 placed by accident, or otherwise, under very different conditions, 

 produce very different forms of life. But what relationship do 

 we owe to the ant? Perhaps this is why the claim is made that 

 the ant has more characteristics of the human being than any 

 other animal." As the ' News ' says, this is carrying us back 

 before the time of Eedi, who lived about 1618. 



The "Notes on West Indian Insects" (24) comprise (1) a 

 reprint of a paper by A. H. Clark in ' Psyche ' (1904) on the 

 Insects of Barbados and other islands, annotated by G. T. 

 Carter ; (2) a reprint of Notes on Orthoptera, by J. A. G. Eehn 

 (in ' Entomological News,' 1905) ; and (3) original notes on a 

 few insects of general interest, by H. A. Ballou. This is 

 followed by an extensive systematic and economic article on 

 " Cotton-stainers " {Astemma or Dysdercus), bugs of the family 

 Pyrrhocoridse, a genus which damages cotton almost all over 

 the world. 



In the 'Entomologist' for 1900 (vol. xxxiii. pp. 361-3), I 

 reviewed, very briefly, Prof. Lameere's " Notes pour la Classifi- 

 cation des Col6opteres." In the 12th Memoir of the Entomo- 

 logical Society of Belgium * Lameere has expounded his views 

 on the classification of the Diptera (26). The division of this 

 order into Orthorrhapha and Cyclorrhapha is rejected, and the 

 following two suborders accepted, viz. : — 



(1.) Nemocera, with the eyes (originally) remote and similar 

 in the two sexes ; 



(2.) Brachycera, with the eyes contiguous, at least in the 

 male, or kainogenetic t and dimorphic. 



In the first the antennae are long and dimorphic, and the 

 maxillary palpi well developed ; in the second the antennse are 

 shortened and similar in the two sexes, the maxillary palpi are 

 reduced, but these characters are not absolute as is that fur- 

 nished by the eyes. 



According to Lameere, the Nemocera vera form one group, 

 the other being formed of the Brachycera and the Nemocera 



* To celebrate the Jubilee of the foundation of the Society. 



f Or cenogenetic, i. e., " relating to modified evolution, in which the 

 non-primitive characters make their appearance in consequence of a secon- 

 dary adaptation of the embryo to the peculiar conditions of its environment." 



