35 



course betweeu the entomologists of the Pacific and Atlantic slopes it 

 has never been found in the Eastern States. 



From these facts it would seem that the apparent facilities for the 

 spread of these Dermestids are counteracted, or at least greatly inter- 

 fered with by the intricate natural laws which govern the distribution 

 of animated beings. — B. A. S. 



CERAMBYCID LARV^ OCCASIONALLY BENEFICIAL. 



Certain cerambycidlarvje {Leptostylus and Ryperplatys) have been ob- 

 served by Mr. Schwarz {Proc. Ent. Soc. of Washington, v. 1, p. 165) to 

 destroy the larvse of Scolytid beetles by running their own galleries 

 through the colonies of the Scolytids. A similar instance is recently re- 

 ported by Professor Altum, of the Forestry Academy at Eberswalde, 

 Germany {Zeitschrift fiir Forst- und Jagdtcesen, v. 22, 1890, p. 55). In 

 consequence of the favorable weather of 1889 the larv?e of Lamia {Acan- 

 thocinus) cedilis were very common and worked so vigorously under the 

 bark of felled pine trees that they crowded out and iiilled the half grown 

 larvse of a Scolytid, Hylesinus ligniperda, which infested the same logs. 



DIMORPHIC FEMALES OF BUTTERFLIES. 



It is a well known fact that in certain Diurnal Lepidoptera the male 

 sex is constant in coloration while the female appears in two forms, one 

 being similar in coloration to the male, the other considerably different 

 therefrom. An instance of this class is our Papilioturnus. In other 

 cases of female dimorphism the form resembling the male is wanting, as 

 is the case in our Argynnis diana. Mr. Charles Oberthiir now advances 

 the question {Ann. i^oc. Ent. France, 1889, Bull., p. ccxxxv) whether in 

 this latter case the form corresponding in coloration with the male should 

 not always exist. He believes that in these polymorphic species the 

 original form of female was of the same coloration as the male, and the 

 aberrant form developed subsequently and gradually. As a proof of 

 this hypothesis he communicates an interesting recent discovery. 

 Argynnis niphe is an old and common species enjoying a remarkably 

 extended range, since it occurs in Abyssinia, India, China, on the 

 Philippine Islands, and Java. From all these widely distant locali- 

 ties the feniale of this species was hitherto known only in a form 

 strikingly different from the male. Quite recently, however, Mr. Ober- 

 thiir received from a place in southern Hindoostan bearing the attrac- 

 tive name of Trichinopolis, specimens which prove that in this particular 

 locality the female of A. niphe differs no more from the male than in 

 most other species of Ar/jrj/ztjiis. Does Mr. Oberthiir's hypothesis hold 

 true in all cases, and should we really expect to tind in our A. diana 

 females which correspond in coloration with the male ? 



AN IMPROVED INSECT LIME. 



Quite a large number of periodicals are devoted in Germany to the 

 various branches of scientific forest culture and contain not infre- 



