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offer you some more detailed observations on two special subjects 
which are suggested by them. 
Giving the precedence to our own “Transactions,” I am happy 
to say that the yearly volume just completed contains papers of 
ereat originality and value, so as fully to maintain its reputation 
as a standard scientific work. The first and most important 
paper is the careful and elaborate monograph of the Ephemeride, 
by the Rev. A. E. Eaton; beautifully illustrated by six plates, 
crowded with details of the structure of the various species. All 
the known species of the family, 178 in number, are fully de- 
scribed, and immense research has been bestowed upon the 
literature and synonymy. 
Three papers, by Messrs. Hewitson and Butler, describe new 
species of butterflies, while Professor Westwood, Messrs. Bates, 
Baly, Sharp, Wollaston, and C. O. Waterhouse, describe new 
Coleoptera. Mr. Albert Miiller discusses the dispersal of non- 
migratory insects by atmospheric agencies, and adduces evidence 
to show that this is constantly going on, and is one of the regular 
means by which the existing geographical distribution of insects 
has been brought about. 
Our honorary member, the Baron de Selys-Longchamps, has 
given us, in a short paper, a summary of the group of dragon-flies 
as at present known; from which it appears that there are 190 
genera and 1357 species, including some in our collections which 
are not yet described. 
Mr. B. T. Lowne has contributed a curious and suggestive 
paper on “Immature Sexuality and Alternate Generation in 
Insects,’ in which he discusses the phenomena of apterous 
females and largely developed horns and other appendages in the 
males, as directly due to sex. He doubts the action of sexual 
selection in producing the horns and other ornaments of beetles, 
and maintains that the apterous and larval forms of the existing 
higher insects are all acquired, and not due to descent from 
ancestral larval forms. 
Mr. W. Arnold Lewis has given us a very important critical 
paper on the arrangement of Lepidoptera, and on the use and 
abuse of synonymic lists and other catalogues. Not only do his 
criticisms appear to me to be, for the most part, sound and of 
great value, but he has treated one of the dryest and most 
uninviting of subjects with so much skill and such command of 
