NA TURE 



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ENTOMOLOGICAL STUDIES AND 

 PROBLEMS. 

 The Hope Reports. Vol. vii., 1908-10. Edited by 

 Prof. Edward B. Poulton, F.R.S. (Oxford': 

 Printed for private circulation by Horace Hart, 

 1910.) 



THIS seventh volume of "Hope Reports" contains 

 publications that have appeared between June, 

 190S, and June, 1910. It contains a mass of interest- 

 ing- material testifying to active interest taken in 

 entomological studies and problems. The volume 

 opens with an account of Dr. F. A. Dixey's patient 

 and exhaustive investigation into the scent-distribut- 

 ing plume scales of the Pierine butterflies. These 

 plume scales, when present, are found only in the 

 male, and are confined to the upper surface of the 

 w ings, sometimes scattered over the general surface 

 of both fore and hind wings, sometimes confined to 

 special areas. An odoriferous secreted substance 

 vt)latilises, and passing through the scales diffuses, 

 giving an odour characteristic of the species of butter- 

 fly. Dr. Dixey passes in review many Pierine butter- 

 flies, and describes the structural characters and the 

 various forms and distribution of the scent-scales, and 

 suggests as a result of his research that the scent- 

 scales have a diagnostic value for specific and cer- 

 tainly for generic distinctions. Further, the occur- 

 rence and the character of the scales can afford 

 subsidiary evidence to other and more relied-on 

 evidences of affinity. 



The never-failing interest in the highly involved 

 phenomenon of protective mimicry is a subject in 

 which British workers — Oxford holding a deservedly 

 foremost place — have won a world reputation, and 

 this explains, and receives justification in, a series of 

 memoirs in this volume of " Hope Reports." Prof. 

 Poulton describes material from Durban, experiment- 

 ally obtained by Mr. G. F. Leigh from the three 

 mimetic female forms of Papilio dardanus, Brown, 

 subspecies cenea, StoU. In dealing with hereditary 

 relationships of the several female forms, evidence 

 is afforded that the proportion of mimetic forms in a 

 locality is due partly to the proportion of, and partly 

 to the relative conspicuousness of, their particular 

 models, and the way is suggested in which the 

 details of mimetic patterns have become adjusted to 

 those of the models. A second paper, by Prof. Poul- 

 ton, on the mimetic North American species of the 

 L;enus Limenitis and their models, is followed • by 

 ■' Some Bionomic Notes on 'BritisSh East African 

 Butterflies," by the Rev. K. St. Aubyn Rogers, who, 



I in a long paper, illustrated by four plates, gives' many 

 original observations bearing on mimicry and its 

 problems. J. C. Moulton follows with an illustrated 

 account (five plates) of some of the principal mimetic 

 (Miillerian) combinations of tropical American butter- 

 '^ies, and Dr. G. B. Longstaff, in a memoir full of 

 nervation, gives many bionomic notes on butter- 



Itiif's from different parts of the world. 

 In all the above memoirs there is much new 

 NO. 2 161, VOL. 86] 



information, and additional experimental and observa- 

 tional evidence in favour of Batesian and Miillerian 

 mimicry. 



The protective mimicry theory can only justify itself 

 if there be proof that the mimics receive protection 

 from insectivorous enemies, and in this connection 

 attention may be directed to memoir No. 8 of these 

 " Hope Reports," where Mr. Guy A. K. Marshall, in 

 " Birds as a Factor in the Production of Mimetic 

 Resemblance among Butterflies," deals with the de- 

 bated question of appetite for butterflies among birds. 

 Mr. Marshall gives here a very satisfying and most 

 helpful review, in fifty-three pages, of such appetite 

 and attack, summarising the evidence from world's 

 records. 



In memoir 9, "An Account of Some Experiments 

 on the Edibility of Certain Lepidopterous Larvae," 

 Mr. Eltringham, in experiments where various larvae 

 were offered to lizards, obtained interesting results 

 with caterpillars of Boarmia rhomhoidaria. These 

 caterpillars are well known to have a very marked re- 

 semblance to ivy twigs, and when motionless may 

 easily be mistaken for twigs. One would have ex- 

 pected that this caterpillar, on being discovered, would 

 prove palatable, whereas these Boarmia rhomhoidaria 

 caterpillars, fed on ivy, proved most distasteful to 

 lizards. The same caterpillars, however, fed on apple 

 for some days, were taken most willingly by the 

 same lizards. 



The systematic side of ■ entomology is represented 

 in the " Reports " by a series of memoirs on the 

 Orthoptera. Three of these are on the Blattidae by 

 an expert in this family, viz.. Mr. R. Shelford, who 

 also writes on "Two Remarkable forms of Mantid 

 Oothecae." Dr. Hancock, of Chicago, describes 

 TetriginjB in the Oxford University Museum, and 

 Dr. Achille Griffini, of Genoa, has three papers on 

 the material at Oxford of Gryllacris, a genus of 

 Locustidae. 



Mr. A. H. Hamm describes the courtship of some 

 Empid species, supplementing previous observations 

 by Howlett. The Empidae, or dance-flies, are pre- 

 daceous flies, found under trees or among shrubs and 

 by streams. The females of some species were 

 observed to circle round in slow flight, and then to be 

 joined by a male. This male, provided with prey 

 (some previously caught fly), singled out a female, 

 and on the two flies settling for copulation, the prey 

 is found to have been transferred to the female. When 

 the insects, male and female, were netted on the wing 

 before settling, the prey was also found in the net. 

 The female sucks the prev during copulation. Mr. 

 Colman J. Wainwright describes Sctulia grisea, a 

 Tachinid new to Britain, and then follow notes on 

 the Lepidoptera of the Dale collection in the Univer- 

 sity of Oxford Museum, by Mr. J. J. Walker; notes 

 on the British dragonflies of the Dale collection, by 

 Mr. W. J. Lucas; and a supplementary list of Cole- 

 optera of the Oxford district, by Mr. J. J. Walker. 

 There is further a series of extracts from the Pro- 

 ceedings of the Entomological Society of London, 

 which include numerous interesting bionomic observa- 

 tions. 



These memoirs and the reports of the Hope Pro- 



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