84 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



scutellum large, transverse, convex ; elytra widened towards the apex, 

 black, shining, impunctate, the basal portion deeply concave, raised 

 near the suture, the sides costate from the shoulders to the apex ; 

 legs very elongate and slender, flavous. 



Hab. Khasia Hills. 



THE NEW WORK ON BRITISH LEPIDOPTERA. 

 By P. Meerifield, F.E.S. 



I had proposed to offer you a rather full notice of the recently 

 published first volume of Mr. Tutt's ' Natural History of the 

 British Lepidoptera,'* which, in comprehensiveness and fulness 

 of detail on all points of interest to the biologist, the systematist, 

 and the collector, is, as regards the particular subjects treated, 

 without a rival. My friend Dr. Chapman, however, who is 

 infinitely better qualified than I am, has forestalled me, leaving 

 a few points to which it may not be out of place to call attention. 

 Among these is the fulness with which Mr. Tutt treats of the 

 egg stage, which is greatly relied on by the author as a leading 

 element in classification, and the information collected by him 

 on which, much of it the result of original enquiry, is extremely 

 valuable. 



Mr. Tutt appears, in preparing this volume, to have fully 

 availed himself of the vast and varied information which recent 

 researches have supplied, in the shape of the treatises, trans- 

 actions of learned societies, and magazine articles published in 

 this and other countries. The whole subject is treated with 

 wideness and appreciativeness of view, and the authorities from 

 whom Mr. Tutt differs, as he often does, but perhaps not 

 more than they differ among themselves, must feel that he is not 

 without good reason for his opinions. It would be giving a 

 wrong impression if this remark led to the inference that the 

 controversial element is a prominent one in this work. Quite 

 the reverse. One of the chief merits of the book is the fulness 

 with which it sets forth the views of other authorities, and the 

 reasons for the choice which it is necessary to make between 

 them and the views, in many cases original, of the author. 



In the general introductory part, occupying 112 pages, there 

 is one subject that will be missed ; there is no chapter on the 

 pupa, that marvellous stage, it may be of only four or five days' 

 duration, during which the creeping larva — the highly specialised 

 product of millions of generations — seems to be almost resolved 

 into primal elements and reorganised into the form of the imago, 



* Published by Swan Sonnenschein & Co., London ; Friedlander & Sohn 

 Berlin. 



