xlix 
, (sometimes even the hour of the day) and the precise locality of capture, so that the 
range of particular forms could be traced, and the limits thereof fixed with accuracy. 
Mr. M‘Lachlan asked the reason why humming-bird hawk-moths (Macroglossa 
. slellatarum) chased up and down stone walls, banks, or cliffs, but particularly stone 
walls near the sea; dozens of specimens might frequently be seen so doing, and in 
positions far removed from any flowers. Mr. A. E. Eaton suggested that the 
habit might result from the extra heat afforded by the walls. And Mr. F. Smith 
mentioned that he had had sent to him from the Isle of Wight some clay 
nests extracted from a wall, which eventually produced hymenopterous insects, but 
which were said by the sender to be formed by the humming-bird-hawk; it seemed 
probable that his correspondent had noticed the moths performing in the manner 
described by Mr. M‘Lachlan in the neighbourhood of the nests, and had thence erro- 
neously inferred that the nests were the workmanship of the moths. 
Mr. A. E. Eaton mentioned that he had, during the past season, found near Lynd- 
hurst a hornet’s nest in a very unusual situation, namely, in a bank composed of sandy 
soil where no wood was near. ‘The colony was a strong one, and the nest so deeply 
imbedded in the bank that he had been unable to take it. 
Mr. M‘Lachlan said that, since the previous Meeting, at which he had stated that 
Liparis dispar existed in this country only in a semi-domesticated state (ante, 
p. xliv.), he had written to Mr. Doubleday on the subject, and that gentleman replied 
as follows :— I do not know of any locality in Britain where it occurs in a state of 
nature, and I am strongly of opinion that it has only been found in the fens round 
" Yaxley ; when I was there in 1839 the larve swarmed on the gale and dwarf sallows. 
* English was there in 1846, and he found the larve pretty common, but not so abun- 
* dant as they were in 1839. Haworth simply says, ‘In salicetis, rarissime.’ I believe 
“all the specimens which were placed in the old collections were continental, or reared 
from eggs brought from the Continent, as they were very different from the fen speci- 
| mens, and just like those found in France; and I think most of those now bred in 
- this country are of continental origin. I once collected a great quantity of the pupe 
‘in Paris, and brought them home to Epping. The following spring I turned out 
’ thousands of larve, but they did not establish themselves, although I saw plenty of 
the moths in one field in August. In 1846 I obtained an immense quantity of eggs 
from moths bred from larve brought from Yaxley. Next spring great numbers of 
larve were turned out on the dwarf sallows growing among the gravel-pits in the 
Forest. A few larvae were seen the following year, but not afterwards. It is very 
" strange that a moth which frequents towns and suburban gardens on the Continent 
‘should be found in such a very different locality here. In France the larve appeared 
to feed principally on the elm.” 
Prof. Westwood repeated that Mr. Briggs’ specimens (ante, p. xliv.) were the 
descendants, only three or four generations removed, of ancestors which were captured 
in a state of freedom. 
Captain T. Hutton, of Mussooree, communicated a “ Note on the Japan Silkworm,” 
in which he expressed his opinion that the Japanese mulberry-feeding form yielding 
green cocoons is nothing more than a hybrid between a sickly and degenerate race 
, of Bombyx Mori and the little monthly-worm, B. Sinensis, and repeated his conviction 
: that, for the purpose of renewing the European stock, experienced entomologists should 
« be deputed to visit different parts of China, with a view to the re-discovery of the silk- 
worm in its natural state of freedom. 
teal 
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