290 PSYGAK. 
ENTOMOLOGICAL ITEMS. 
Dr. C. V. RILEY was reappointed Ento- 
mologist of the United States Department of 
Agriculture, 6 July 1881, and entered upon 
his duties 1 Aug. 1881. 
CapTAIN HOLDEN, who has recently re- 
moved to Cincinnati from Marietta, Ohio, 
has been an enthusiastic collector of spiders 
ever since his college days. In the pursuit of 
this fancy he has collected nearly 25,000 spec- 
imens, embracing 4000 species, from all parts 
of the world. They are arranged in glass 
bottles, with labels giving name, collector 
and locality. California furnished 5000 spec- 
imens, and New England as many more. 
One species is represented by 108 specimens, 
from all parts of the United States, showing 
how much effect environment has in modify- 
ing form. The collection is supplemented by 
a full and complete catalogue of the literature 
of the subject, comprising about 70,000 refer- 
ences on 10,000 cards. This valuable contri- 
bution to the study of this little-known branch 
of natural history he hopes to complete and 
publish at an early day.-— Bost. d. advert., 3 
Aug. 1881, v. 138, no. 27, p. 4. 
Mr. J. W. FREESE, of Cambridge, Mass., 
communicates to us the following : — 
I thinking to drive away a large harvest- 
man (Phalangium) by pressing the extremity 
of one of its legs gently with the edge of my 
pocket-knife, it, to my surprise, instead of 
running away, placed the injured part in its 
mouth and began to moisten it with a fluid 
secretion, behaving much as a child does with 
a wounded finger. I repeated the pressure 
on three or four different legs, and afterward 
experimented with another spider. always 
with the same result. 
At another time I drove one of these spiders 
from place to place by gently touching it. 
Finally it took a position on a horizontal 
leaf, its long legs projecting beyond the edge 
of the leaf. I touched these extremities as 
before. whereupon it began to move its body 
rapidly up and down, seemingly thinking 
thus to frighten away its supposed enemy. 
Hasits oF dombylius. The December 
number of the ‘‘American entomologist” 
gives further details about the preying of the 
larva of bombylius on locust-eggs. The 
species of the fly was ascertained by breeding, 
nearly at the same time, by Mr. Lemmon in 
California, and by the able editor of the 
American entomologist, Mr. C. V. Riley. 
Two gencra were obtained by Mr. Riley: 
systoechus, a genus also represented in Eu- 
rope, and occurring principally in dry plains; 
and ¢rzodites (O. S., Western dipt.) ; belong- 
ing to the group domatina. It must be borne 
in mind, however, that the larvae of bomby- 
Zius (in the narrower sense) live in the cells 
of different bees (axdrena, colletes, halictus), 
as has been ascertained by the direct obser- 
vations of MacLeay (Ann. nat. hist., 1838), 
Morelet (Bull. soc. entom. France, 1845, p. 
xxiv), Schmidt Goebel (Stettiner ent. Zeit., 
1876, p. 392), and T. A. Chapman (Entom. 
mo. mag., 1878, v. 14, p. 196). What re- 
mains to be ascertained now, are the early 
stages of those larvae, which, as Mr. Riley 
very acutely remarks (/. c. p. 282), very prob- 
ably are ‘‘much more active than in the later 
stages and of a somewhat different structure.” 
This results from the fact that the fly per- 
forms the act of oviposition in the open air, 
that is, some distance from the underground 
nest of the bee; this act was closely observed 
by Dr. Chapman; but we have also earlier 
observations, the earliest being that of Gil- 
bert White (Nat. hist. of Selborne): ‘‘The 
female (he says) seems to lay its eggs as it 
poises on its wings, by striking its tail on the 
ground and against the grass that stands in 
its way, in a quick manner, for several times 
together.” A similar observation was made 
by Frauenteld on the oviposition of lomatia 
(Verh. Z.-B. Ges., 1864, p. 688). The state- 
ments of Zetterstedt (Ins. Lapp.. p. 520) and 
Zeller (Isis, 1840, p. 25.) on the oviposition 
of anthrax differ in the tact that both ob- 
servers saw the fly ¢wsert the end of the 
abdomen in the soil.—C: R. OsTEN SACKEN 
in Entom. mo. mag., Feb. 1881, vy. 17, p. 
206-207. 
—e— ee 
