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at the bottom. His explanation of the phenomenon did not meet with general 
acceptance; it was objected that radiation was scarcely likely to produce a cylindrical 
| excavation; and Mr. A. R. Wallace doubted whether an insect of so small bulk and 
mass, and which could only give off by radiation the heat which it had first absorbed, 
was capable, even though of dark colour, of absorbing sufficient to produce the con- 
siderable melting of the snow around it which the President had described. 
Prof. Westwood directed attention to Karsten’s recently-published ‘ Beitrag zur 
Kenntniss des Rhynchoprion penetrans,’ and protested against the generic appellation - 
there applied to the Chigoe or Jigger. Linneus was uncertain to what genus to refer 
the insect, and Latreille suggested that a new genus was probably required for its 
reception; the Rev. Lansdown Guilding had in MS. assigned to it the name Sarco- 
phaga, which, however, had been previously employed amongst the Diptera. In a 
paper in the ‘ Transactions’ of this Society (vol. ii. p. 199), Prof. Westwood had him- 
self first given the generic characters and published the name Sarcopsylla; Dugés had 
about the same written on the Jigger, but referred it to the genus Pulex, and Guérin- 
Méneville, in the interval between the reading (May 1, 1837) and the publication 
(1840) of his (Prof. W.’s) paper, had on the plates of the ‘Iconographie du Réegne 
Animal’ employed the name Dermatophilus, but his description was not published tll 
long afterwards. The name Sarcopsylla was entitled to stand, according to the rule 
of priority, and Prof. Karsten was not justified in rejecting it, and falling back upon 
Rhynchoprion, which had been formerly used for a genus of Acari. Prof. Westwood 
also took credit to himself for having first shown that the Jigger was oviparous, not 
larviparous or pupiparous; Prof. Karsten had now shown how the sexes might be dis- 
tinguished before the female became gravid: the ‘ Beitrag’ also contained elaborate 
details of the structure and anatomy of the Jigger, but it did not contain one word on 
the generic arrangement, nor did it add one single fact to the natural history of the 
species. He (Prof. W.) was anxious to know what became of the eggs after they were 
deposited, (say) in the toe of a human being? where did they hatch? and where and 
upon what did the larve feed? There could not be room for all the numerous eggs to 
develope in such a situation as above supposed ; and moreover, in the vast majority of 
instances the eggs could not be deposited in flesh at all. 
Mr. Bates had had personal experience of the attacks of the Jigger, but was unable 
to answer the Professor’s enquiries ; the common belief was that the body of the female 
burst within the toe, that the eggs hatched therein, and that the larve fed upon the 
flesh ; but he had never had anything but eggs (no larve or pupz) extracted from his 
own person; if during the process of extraction the body of the female burst, he had 
always applied tobacco-juice to prevent any ill effect. 
; Paper read. 
Mr. Bates read a paper “ On the Species of Agra of the Amazons Region.” 
In the introduction, the author treats of the affinities and describes the habits of 
this arboreal genus of Carabide peculiar to Tropical America, and then proceeds to 
characterize sixteen new Amazonian species, whereby the total number of described 
species is advanced to 140. Forty-seven species of Agra and Agridia are recorded as 
occurring in the Amazons region; of these forty-two were found by Mr. Bates, and 
thirty-one of them were new to Science. 
The employment by Mr. Bates of the two forms Carabici and Carabide to denote 
the same group of insects evoked from the President a strong protest against the in- 
