126 



Power's insect is llie Trox hispiclus of Laichart, and that his own insect is a variety of 

 the same, in which the thorax is very sparingly pnuclured, whereas it should be rather 

 thickly punctured. The species is readily distinguished by the alternate rows of 

 smaller and larger tubercles on the elytra. 



The Crioceris dodecastigma, which has until quite receutly been confounded in 

 his collection (never having been looked at probably since it was received), is distin- 

 guished from C. 12-punctala by the legs and under parts of the body being entirely 

 black, instead of red. The orbit of the eye is also entirely black, and the antennae 

 are less stout, &:c. 



Mr. Rye exhibited a specimen of Deleaster dichrous, taken in a house at Glasgow ; 

 a female of Odonlsiis mobilicornis, from Darenth Wood ; and a singular male example 

 of Rhynchiles betuleti, destitute of the usual spines on the thorax. 



Mr. Westwood exhibited some examples of the pupae of Papilio Machaon, received 

 from Dr. Verloren, and detailed some experiments by him, proving that the well-known 

 diversity of colour in the pupae of this species is not indicative of the sexes, or of any 

 variation in the colours of the imago. 



Natural Cross Breeding in Bees, 



Mr. Tegetmeier described a series of experiments he had been making recently to 

 ascertain whether there existed any natural means for preventing continued inter- 

 breeding in the honey bee. He slated that his own experience, as a breeder of several 

 varieties of vertebrate animals, was that continued interbreeding led to deterioration 

 of size, great delicacy of constitution, and ultimately to extinction of the race. It had 

 been alleged, in opposition to these views,lhat continuous interbreeding was not injurious 

 to the bee, the young queens being supposed to be fertilized by the drones of the same 

 hive, bred from the same parent. It is well known that on a stranger worker bee 

 attempting to enter a hive it is at once seized by the guanls, and, unless it succeeds in 

 escaping, stung to death. He found that on placing drones captured as they entered 

 one hive at the entrance of another they ran in and were readily received. In order 

 to ascertain whether they ever willingly entered other hives than those from which they 

 emerged, he marked them as they flew forth, by dusting them with flour, and observed 

 that about one-third of the whole number flew into other hives on their return. The 

 workers do not appear to disliuguish between stranger drones and those of their own 

 hive ; in fact the drones seem common to all the hives in an apiary ; hence, even sup- 

 posing a young queen to be always fertilized by the drones inhabiting the hive in which 

 she is reared, continuous interbreeding must of necessity be prevented. 



Mr. Tegetmeier also exhibited reared specimens of Apis Ligustica, from a hive of 

 that species at the Apiary, Muswell Hill, London. 



Mr. Westwood read " Remarks on the Efl"ects of Time and Heat in the Develop- 

 ment of certain Sphingidae," being the results of jnost elaborate observations, by Dr. 

 Verloren, on Sphinx Ligustri and other species. 



Mr. Scott read descriptions of four new species of Coleophora, viz., C. Melilotella, 

 C. Artemisiella, C. Ardaepennella and C. politella. 



Part 6 of the current volume of the Society's ' Transactions ' were announced as 

 published. 



