xvn 



odour, resembling that of ants or bees' (Fifth Report on Noxious Insects of 

 New York, p. 3). I do not remember to have noticed this odour in any of the 

 winged species I have reared." 



Mr. F. Smith exhibited two remarkable forms of Hjmenoptera from the Rocky- 

 Mountains, the Masaris vespoides of Cresson, and Pterochilus 5-fasciatus of Say, 



The Secretary exhibited a mole-cricket sent to the Society by Mr. A. P. 

 Falconer, who found it running about the cabin of his daahbeeh on his return 

 from PhilaB to Alexandria. The specimen had been compared by Mr. M'Lachlan 

 with the descriptions in Mr. Scudder's recent paper in the first volume of the 

 Memoirs of the Peabody Academy, and he believed it to be Gryllotalpa cophta, 

 the Gryllus cophtus of De Haan, figured by Savigny, Descrip. de I'Egypte, 

 Orthoptera, pi. 3. 



The Secretary read the following note on the spectrum of the fire-fly, 

 extracted from the Journal of the Society of Arts : — 



" The spectrum given by the light of the common fire-fly of New Hampshire 

 is, according to Mr. C. A. Young's observations, perfectly continuous, without 

 trace of lines either bright or dark. It extends from a little above Frauu- 

 hofer's line C in the scarlet, to about F in the blue, gradually fading out at 

 the extremities. It is precisely this portion of the spectrum that is composed 

 of rays which, while they more powerfully than any other affect the organs of 

 vision, produce hardly any thermal or active effect. Very little, in fact, of the 

 energy expended in the flash of the fire-fly is wasted. It is quite different with 

 our artificial light. In an ordinary gas-light, it is proved that not more than 

 one or two per cent, of the radiant energy consists of visible rays, the rest is 

 either invisible heat or actinism ; in other words, more than ninety-eight per 

 cent, of the gas is wasted in producing rays that do not help in making objects 

 visible." 



Mr. G. R. Crotch sent for exhibition British specimens of four species of 

 Dasytidae ; one being Dohchosoma protensa, taken some years ago in the Isle 

 of Wight, and agreeing entirely with Spanish specimens taken at Carthagena ; 



as well be dei-ived from (3joj and p'C*, in the sense of liviiig in the root, as from /3/a 

 and pi^a, in the sense of injurious to the root ; and even if the latter he the true 

 derivation, I should like to submit, for Dr. Fitch's re-consideration, whether the 

 remedj- (Biarhiza) is not worse than the disease (Biorhiza), and whether the name 

 should not be written Biorrhiza instead of as we find it in books. At p. IC of the 

 same Eeport, Dr. Fitch describes a new beetle under the name Lelojms Querci (adding 

 that "it is very closely related to the Facetious Leiopus"), and at p. 24, a new Aphis 

 under the name Eriosoma Querci: I believe the word querci as the genitive of quercus 

 does once occur in a writer on husbandry in the third century of the Christian eera, but 

 query whether it was worth whUe to have dug out this singularity : why not have been 

 content with the ordinary genitive quercus? — J, W^ Di 



a 



