352 Linnean Society. 
the author concludes that Mr. Kirby’s insect is the larva of some 
species of another genus of the same family. 
The. habits of the larva of Meloé are then investigated, and the 
effects produced on it by exposure to light are minutely detailed. 
When light was totally excluded the larve remained perfectly quiet 
for several days, but the instant light was admitted they were in 
motion, travelling rapidly in a direction towardsit. The experiments 
were made by enclosing larve in a phial, which was inverted and 
turned in opposite directions. When the phial was placed perpen-. 
dicularly they invariably ascended to the top, and when placed in a ~ 
horizontal direction they always ran to that end which was nearest 
the light, even when the stopper around which they had been lying 
was removed to allow of their escape. ‘This influence of light Mr. 
Newport conceives may be that which induces them to ascend the 
yellow flowers of the dandelion and buttercup preparatory to their 
attaching themselves to bees that alight on the flowers to collect 
pollen, and which then carry them into their nests. ‘This seems to 
be the object of their attacking the bees, to be carried to the nest 
where they are to reside as parasites, and subsist on the food stored 
up for the bee-larva, and not to prey on the bee itself. 
The full-grown larva of Meloé cicatricosus is then described, and 
also the nymph and the imago. The author has found the insect in 
those stages in the nests of Anthophora retusa; but he has not 
hitherto succeeded in his attempts to rear the young larva of M. 
violaceus and M. proscarabeus in the nests of that insect. He con- 
cludes, therefore, that these species inhabit the nests of some other 
bees. In the stage between the very young and the full-grown period 
the larva is believed to be active and retain its six scaly feet, and 
to feed on the food prepared for the young bee. In its full-grown 
state the legs of the larva are reduced to six short tubercles. ‘The 
insect is then very fat, inanimate, and of an orange-yellow colour, 
has ten pairs of spiracles, and greatly resembles the full-grown 
Hymenopterous larva. It remains but a short time in this condition 
before it changes to a nymph, and soon afterwards to an imago, in 
which form it passes the winter in a state of hybernation and comes 
forth in the spring. 
In the course of this paper, while detailing the influence of light 
on the larva of Meloé, Mr. Newport stated that he had been led by 
these and other facts, which showed the great influence of light on 
the instincts of the young animal, “to regard light as the primary 
source of all vital and instinctive power, the degrees and variations 
of which may, perhaps, be referred to modifications of this influence 
on the special organization of each animal body.’ This view has 
suggested itself to him in connexion with the discovery recently 
made by Mr. Faraday of the analogy of light with magnetism and 
electricity, and the close relation, previously shown by Matteucci to 
exist between electricity and nervous power, on which not only all 
the vital actions, but also the instinctive faculties seem to depend. 
