THE ENTOMOLOGIST, 311 
acquainted on British Diptera; the price is 18s. per volume. 
On British Hymenoptera we have several excellent works: 
(1) Shuckard’s ‘ Fossorial Hymenoptera,’ 1 vol., with descrip- 
tions of all the species and outline-figures of the wings of the 
genera, price 14s.; (2) Smith’s ‘Catalogue of the British 
Bees,’ with descriptions of the species and outline figures of 
the genera, price 6s.; (3) Smith’s ‘Catalogue of the British 
Fossorial Hymenoptera,’ with descriptions of the species and 
outline-figures of the wings, price 6s. 
Nyssia lapponaria in Scotland.—In the notice of the 
obliging but hurried communication made by Mr. Bond on 
the capture of this insect there are two mistakes, neither of 
great importance, but both requiring correction. Mr. Roper- 
Curzon, who is the owner of the insect, is not a clergyman, 
but a barrister; and Mr. Meek, not Mr. Curzon, employed 
Warrington as a collector. Mr. Meek has obligingly shown 
me the specimen, which is a very beautiful one. The species 
is figured, in the ‘Annals of the Entomological Society of 
France,’ as the Biston lapponaria of Boisduval; and there is 
an excellent figure of it (440) in Herrich-Scheeffer, but this 
differs from Mr. Roper-Curzon’s specimen in having a distinct 
crimson medio-dorsal stripe on the thorax, which is scarcely 
perceptible in the Scotch specimen ; and the Scotch specimen 
has a distinct yellow costa, which character is scarcely per- 
ceptible in Herrich-Scheffer’s figure. It has been suggested 
that the Lapponaria of Boisduval is a variety of Pomonaria of 
Esper, also figured by Herrich-Scheffer (439); but I think, 
without sufficient reason: Herrich-Scheffer places both in 
the genus Amphidasys (p. 100). 
Timarcha tenebricosa.—The plump metallic-green larva 
which A. S. F. enclosed is the larva of a beetle, Timarcha 
tenebricosa: it will feed freely on a plant called clivers or 
cleavers (Galium aparine), found in every hedge, and 
remarkable for the tenacity with which it clings to everything 
it touches; this plant and Rubia peregrina climb by a 
process very rare among plants, the contact of minute hooks 
scattered over the surface cf the leaves and stalks. The 
beetle in all its stages confines itself to hedge-weeds; and, 
although the specimen was found in a garden, you may rely 
on receiving no material injury from its depredations. 
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