1 894-] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 247 



N. symmorpha was taken with other solitary jvasps while using 

 the beating net. 



As the first two mentioned are southern species, the capture 

 of them in this locality, fifty miles northwest of Chicago, is 

 thought worthy of record. The Nortonia is always rare, and its 

 capture, therefore, noticeable. I have taken a large number of 

 species, recorded in Cresson's catalogue as from Texas, in this 

 locality, and think the fact of some value in its relation to the 

 geographical distribution of the North American Hymenoptera. 



The white sweet clover, Melilotus alba, has become very trou- 

 blesome since its introduction in this section, crowding the high- 

 ways and overpowering the Solidagos, Asters, and other prairie 

 weeds. But the Hymenoptera take kindly to it, and I have 

 found it, in Summer and Autumn, a splendid collecting ground. 

 On it I have taken many of the larger Scolidae, Larridae, Pom- 

 pilidae, Sphecidse, Vespidae, Crabronidse, Philanthidae, Andrenidae 

 and Apidae very abundantly, as well as numbers of specimens of 

 all families. It is also an excellent collecting ground for Tach- 

 inidae, Syrphidae, Stratiomyidae and other families of Diptera. 

 I never visit a patch of the plant in August, September or Oc- 

 tober, without finding a large variety of desirable species.* 



A Bouquet of Local Odor for the Breakfast Table. — The col- 

 lection of beetles in the Academy of Natural Sciences, so useful in clas- 

 sifying and determining the identity of pests destructive to agriculture, 

 numbers several specimens of the Hercules, the largest of American 

 beetles. This variety has grown so scarce that a collector in this city paid 

 a good price for one to a youth who found it on an up-town sidewalk a 

 few days ago. It was perfectly preserved, and, including the immense 

 horn, measured four inches in length. A fact not generally known about 

 this variety is, that by noting that the larvae possessed an odor resembling 

 that of Russian leather, and that they fed on decayed ash timber, a 

 Middletown (N. Y. ) tanner succeeded in producing a leather claimed to 

 be fully equal to the Russian and now largely used in the binding of books. 

 — Newspaper Entomology. 



Locusts and dragonflies, the latter commonly called "devil's darning 

 needles," have had a battle in the air at Perth Amboy, N. J., and such of 

 the locusts as survived have only felt sew-sew ever since. — Newspaper. 



* I am indebted to Mr. Wm. J. Fox for the determination of the species mentioned. 



