eo XXVlil_) 
Mr. E. Saunders said that this species was now generally considered to 
be only a form of L. umbratus, Nyl., differing from typical specimens in 
having a narrower head and the pubescence more scattered. 
Mr. A. 8. Olliff exhibited a specimen of Papilio americus, Koll. (sadalus, 
Lucas), in which the neuration of the posterior wings was asymmetrical. 
The radial nervure was wanting in the right posterior wing, and the 
precostal nervures were dissimilar and abnormal; the submarginal spots in 
the right hind wing were also abnormal, and the tail was much shorter than 
in the other wing. 
The Secretary read a letter, addressed to Mr. A. R. Wallace, from 
Mr. James Blyth, of Vanualevu, Fiji, as follows :-— 
““Our cocoa-nut trees are suffering more severely than usual this year 
from the ravages of an insect called by the natives ‘ mimimata’ (mi or mimi 
and mata). In Hazlewood’s Dictionary it is called ‘an insect of the Mantis 
genus which lives chiefly on the leaves of the cocoa-nut; sometimes the nut 
leaflets are stript of all but their ribs by it. It is avery filthy animal, ejecting 
a most fetid fluid at one’s eyes; from the last circumstance it takes its 
name. When this liquid is ejected into the eye it causes very great pain and 
sometimes blindness. The planters called it a Phasma, or of the Phasmide 
family—the cocoa-nut-eating Lopaphus (Lopaphus cocophagus).’ ‘There is 
a larger insect in our woods—I have seen them 15 to 18 inches long—that 
looks like it, called by the natives in Bua dialect ‘ Nasagaurara’ (= Nasan- 
gaurara), and in the ‘ Scientific American’ of 27th September, 1879, there 
is a figure, copied from ‘ La Nature,’ of an insect like this latter, called 
‘Kerokrana Papuana.” ‘The mimimata is more plentiful in some seasons 
than in others, and most plentiful and destructive when there has been no 
hurricane (January to March). The planters wish to introduce some bird 
that will clear the trees of the insects, and yet not destroy the early flower 
of the nut or pick the berries of the coffee plant, or the ears of the maize, &c. 
This is a matter of vital importance to us all and to the colony.” 
Mr. C. O. Waterhouse mentioned that the two Phasmide referred to 
were no doubt the Lopaphus cocophayes, Newp., and Phibalosoma Apollonius, 
Westw.; specimens of the latter were in the British Museum Collection 
from Vanualevu ; also specimens of Phibalosoma Pythonius, Westw.—rather 
the larger species—from Ngau, Fiji. Mr. Waterhouse remarked that the 
mention of Mantis was an obvious error, the Mantide being carnivorous. 
Mr. E. A. Fitch said of course the Phasmide@ were protected species, 
but the introduction of the Kinghunter (Haleyon sancta, Vig.) might prove 
useful, as Mr. EK. L. Layard had related in ‘ The Field’ (August 10, 1878), 
that this bird fed greedily on Cicadida@, &e., in New Caledonia. Lopaphus 
cocophages was the species mentioned in our Proceedings (Trans. Ent. Soc. 
Lond., i., xii; Proc. July 6th, 1835) by Mr. Nightingale as so very 
destructive to the cocoa-nut trees in the neighbouring Friendly Isles. 
