XXIV 



Ent. Soc, 1868, p. xv.), exhibited some stems of juniper from Godalming which 

 bore swellings, some of very large size, which were supposed to be caused by 

 insects. 



Mr. W. Warwick King (who was present as a Visitor) exhibited a miscel- 

 laneous collection of insects from Tugela, near the Drakenborg Mountains, 

 Natal. 



The Secretary exhibited a collection of insects sent to the Society by 

 Mr. Henry AnseU, from Kinsembo, S. W. Coast of Africa. In the letter which 

 accompanied them, dated " Kinsembo, 23 Febry., 1870," the writer described 

 the insects as " captured in this locality : the Coleoptera of this coast are 

 certainly wanting, as I have on several occasions visited the most likely 

 localities and found next to nothing. I hope, however, within a few months to 

 visit Cabenda, where I believe I shall have better success." 



Mr. Butler mentioned that whilst looking through the volumes of Freyer's 

 Beitrage he had stumbled upon three plates illustrating the metamorphoses of 

 Argynnis Niobe and Adippe, and upon referring to the text he found some 

 interesting remarks on the possible identity of the two forms. He then read a 

 translation of a passage (Neuere Beitrage, vol. iii. p. 11), from which it 

 appeared that, though at one time firm in the belief that the two were distinct 

 species, Freyer's confidence in the correctness of that view was very much 

 shaken when he succeeded in rearing both from the caterpillar. In vol. iv., 

 however, Freyer added that his later investigations left him still in doubt, 

 though he adduced additional evidence in favour of their identity. The 

 distinctions which he relied on in the perfect insects did not hold good iu 

 examples in Mr. Butler's collection ; the figures of the larvae show a very close 

 resemblance, the differences being less conspicuous than from Freyer's descrip- 

 tion would be expected, and even those differences, according to Freyer, are not 

 constant. Mr. Butler concluded as follows : — " If then the larvae and the 

 imagines vary inter se, and the pupae are alike, why are we to consider the two 

 species distinct ? Is it because there is a something about the two insects that 

 at once tells us which form we have before us, even though we cannot describe 

 it ? I do not admit that this is always the case, but if it were, it is no more 

 than one sees in acknowledged varieties of Vanessa C-album and fifty other 

 species." 



Major Munn (who was present as a Visitor) exhibited a number of ' 

 anatomical drawings of the honey-bee and its larva, and numerous pieces 

 of comb in illustration of the views expressed by him as to the reproduction of 

 the bee. Criticizing and dissenting from the theory of Dzierzon and Von Siebold, 

 the speaker stated his belief that there was perceptible difference between the 

 male eggs and female eggs ; that the natural duration of life of the queen bee 

 was two years, in the first of which she laid the contents of the first ovary, and 

 in the second year of the second ovary ; that the eggs first laid from each ovary 

 were females, and the last laid were males ; and that it was only occasionally 



