138 THE ENTOMOLOGIST, 



cases, for there is little evidence that the fungus is used to any extent 

 as food. Tlie ants build their nests usually of rotten wood, at times 

 also of particles of earth, sand, &c. The particles are fastened 

 together by means of a secretion, but the walls so formed are also 

 interpenetrated by fungoid hyphse, which ramify through their sub- 

 stance and appear to give stability to the whole. In addition to these 

 intramural hyphfe, the fungus also appears as a down-like coating on 

 the surface of the wall. The evidence as to intention on the part of 

 the ants is based on the facts that the fungus occurs as a pure 

 culture, unmixed with other genera; and that it always occurs in the 

 nests. The purpose would appear to be to give stability to the walls, 

 but this applies only to the intramural hypbae ; the object of the extra- 

 mural coatmg may be to serve to some extent as food ; perhaps it also 

 roughens the walls, and so affords the ants foothold. The fungus 

 must depend for food chiefly upon the mortar-like secretion by means 

 of which the particles of the walls are fastened together." (Proc. Roy. 

 Micr. Soc). Q ^ ^ 



Das Tierreich. 11 Lieferung : Forficulidae and Hemimeridae. A. de 

 BoRMANs and H. Krauss. Berlin : 1900. 

 In October last De Bormans and Krauss, in the eleventh number 

 of 'Das Tierreich,' gave to the world a monograph of the Forficnlidse 

 and Hemimeridffl. The bulk of the volume, which is a large octavo 

 of 142 pages, in paper covers, is occupied with descriptions, together 

 with short synonymy and habitat, of 308 species of earwigs; 31 more 

 or less doubtful species ; 20 subspecies ; and one variety. These are 

 distributed amongst thirty genera (with two more uncertain ones). 

 We believe, however, that the work has been so long in progress that 

 it is even now somewhat out of date. The total does not seem a for- 

 midable one for the earwigs of the whole world, though beside it the 

 British list of eight species is meagre indeed, especially when we 

 consider that but three of them — Forjictda auricidana, F, lesnei, and 

 Labia minor — can be taken naturally out in the open. The other five 

 are, with us, dwellers within doors, as Anisolabis annulipes and Aptery- 

 gida arachidis ; or historical, as Labidum riparia, Apterygida media 

 ( = albipennis), and Anisolabis maritima. For the account of the 

 curious family Hemimeridae, which seems to lie between the Forficu- 

 lidae and the rest of the Orthoptera, Krauss is responsible. He makes 

 but one species, Hemimerus taipoides, though perhaps there is a distinct 

 one — H. hanseni, both, however, being found in the equatorial regions 

 of West Africa. The book contains a short introduction, a number of 

 tables, and forty-seven clear outline illustrations in the text, forty- six 

 being devoted to earwigs, and the last to Hemimerus taipoides. The 

 text is in German, and is well printed by Friedlander und Sohn, of 



W. J. Lucas. 



British FFm. Vol. viii. By G. H. Verrall, F.E.S. Pp. 1-691, with 

 458 text-figures. London: Gurney & Jackson. 1901. 

 OoR author adopts the Suborders — Diptera-Orthoirhapha, and 

 Diptera-Cyclorrhapha — of Brauer, divisions which are founded on the 



