XXX11 
JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS. 
“Descriptions of some New Exotic Insects.’’ By G. R. Water- 
house, Esq. 
In the discussion which ensued, Mr. Hope observed, in allusion 
to the communications of Messi's. Yarrell and Scales, that it ap- 
peared to him not improbable, that the great increase in the num- 
ber of obnoxious insects observed during the last two or three 
years, might possibly be attributed to the mildness of the winters, 
whence the Halticee, Athalice, and other turnip-destroying insects 
had received no check. He had also observed the turnips in the 
neighbourhood of Shrewsbury to be destroyed by the larvae of 
Agrotis, many of which were found at each root. 
Mr. Waterhouse observed, that the insects which he had de- 
scribed in the memoir just read, were species which possessed the 
appearance of groups, to which they did not in fact belong ; thus 
the Dasytes had the appearance of Ctenostoma, Belus of Lixus, Lep- 
tosomus of Brentus, and Thoracantha of Mordella. He had, at a 
former meeting, exhibited a collection of insects of some extent, 
from the museum of the president, showing many such representa- 
tive relations ; and he considered that each group contained types 
of all other groups of equal rank with itself ; thus the order Coleop- 
tera contained representatives of all the other orders. He also 
thought it would be highly interesting to examine the comparative 
structure of these analogous groups in detail, as it was not impro- 
bable that by so doing, we might obtain a clue to the knowledge of 
the uses of many peculiarities of structure existing in both such 
groups, of which we are at present completely ignorant ; as for ex- 
ample, the bifid claws in the floral Lamellicorns, and in certain bees, 
as noticed in his Monograph upon Diphucephala, or the incrassated 
hind-legs of the Donacice and C/ialcides, both of which groups reside 
upon subaquatic plants, and neither of which are saltatorial. In mak- 
ing these remarks, however, he wished it to be understood, that he 
was not an advocate either of the quinarian or circular distribution ; 
and he cited the group of Carabidce, which appeared to him to have 
been unnaturally forced into an circular series by the union of Ble- 
thisa and Elaphrus with Carabus, and which he considered unna- 
tural. 
Mr. Hope also objected to the circular distribution of groups, 
and contended that this theory was borrowed from the ancients. 
Mr. Westwood, in acknowledging the relations of analogy pointed 
out by Mr. Waterhouse, detailed the uses which had been proposed 
to be made by Messrs. M‘Leay, Swainson, &c. of such relations, 
for the purpose of ascertaining the correctness of and verifying dis- 
tributions founded primarily upon direct affinities ; but he con- 
