Zoological Society. 395 



The following extracts from the observations of Mr. William 

 Curtis in the year 1800 refer chiefly to this species, or to ^. 

 Malva, on columbine : 



" In very cold weather Aphides are oviparous, for this obvious 

 reason : the eggs are capable of resisting cold more powerfully 

 than the young. On the 22nd of November I found a con- 

 siderable number of eggs which had been deposited in some 

 auricula plants by a small green Aphis, which infests plants very 

 generally, while the same species, on a geranium that I kept 

 within doors, produced young. In mild winters I have observed 

 in the month of January the same species of Aphis in great 

 numbers on the same species of Primula, without doors, and all 

 the females viviparous. These are facts that prove that all 

 Aphides are not oviparous and viviparous at the same season, 

 but that some may be wholly viviparous ; that all such as are 

 both oviparous and viviparous do not lay eggs towards the mid- 

 dle of autumn, nor at all during the winter, unless a certain 

 degree of cold takes place/^ " Seasons sometimes occur very 

 irregularly indeed, on an average, perhaps, once in four or six 

 years, in which they (the Aphides) are multiplied to such an 

 extent that the usual means of diminution fail in preventing 

 them from doing irreparable injury to certain crops. In 

 severe winters we have no doubt but that Aphides are very con- 

 siderably diminished ; in very mild winters we know that they 

 are very considerably increased; for they not only exist during 

 such seasons, but continue to multiply.'^ " The common green 

 Aphis, which is so generally destructive, lives during the winter 

 season on such herbaceous plants as it remained on during the 

 autumn, either in its egg or perfect state. If the weather be mild, 

 it multiplies greatly on such herbage ; as the spring advances, 

 in May the males and females of these insects acquire wings : 

 and thus the business of increase, hitherto confined, is widely 

 and rapidly extended." 



[To be continued.] 



PROCEEDINGS OF LEARNED SOCIETIES. 



ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



March 27, 1849.— Wm. Yarrell, Esq., Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Monograph of the large African species of Nocturnal 

 Lepidoptera belonging or allied to the genus Satur- 

 NiA. By J. O. Westwood, F.L.S. etc. (Continued from 

 p. 306. 



Section C. 



Sp. 13. Saturnia Epimethea. S.alis anticis subfalcatis ; mb- 

 fuscis striga communi subapicali obscura extus pallide griseo 



