296 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



and Lycana sephyrus var. lycidas, from Switzerland. — Mr. Carr, ova 

 of Boarmia gemmaria, deposited in a box among ova of one of the 

 " thorns." — Mr. Turner, specimens of the Coleopteron Cetonia aurata, 

 from Cortina ; bred Cassida viridis (?) from larvae on a Salvia near 

 Konig See, Bavaria ; and a nest of a wasp, taken from a wall on the 

 road leading from Cortina to Pieve di Cadore. — Mr. Sich reported the 

 occurrence of a Tineid, Tineola biselliella, in some numbers, in the 

 Indian rat-snake's den at the Zoological Gardens. — Mr. Step read a 

 communication, describing how wasps (Vespa germanica) deliberately 

 cut holes through tennis netting which had impeded the direct road 

 to their nest in his garden. — H. J. Turner, Hon. Rep. Secretary. 



OBITUARY. 



Odo Morannal Reuter. 



There died, on September 2nd last, in Finland, Professor Odo 

 Morannal Reuter, of the Finnish University of Helsingfors, who, 

 among many other distinctions as an entomologist of the first rank, 

 was one of the twelve Honorary Fellows of the Entomological 

 Society of London, to which he was elected in 1906.- Born at Abo 

 sixty-three years ago, it was there that he passed the last years of 

 his life and eventually died. But, though blind for the past five 

 years, he never ceased to work at his favourite science, and the 

 writer of this note well remembers the courageous and hopeful letter 

 he addressed to his colleagues when he recognized that blindness 

 was inevitable. As Emeritus Professor of Zoology at Helsingfors, 

 and a linguist proficient in all the tongues of Northern Europe, 

 including English, hardly a year passed between 1870 and 1910 

 without some contribution from his laboratory to our knowledge of 

 the less studied groups of insects. Articles upon Hemiptera-Hetero- 

 ptera, Thysanoptera, and Collembola, filling as separata five pages of 

 the Catalogue of the Entomological Society's Library, testify to the 

 fertility of his genius and the diligence of his pen. He was also an 

 accepted authority upon Economic Entomology, and published in 

 Helsingfors, Stockholm, and Berlin many " popular " books devoted 

 to animal psychology which enjoy a wide circulation. The last work 

 of this kind, says a correspondent of the ' Morning Post ' (writing 

 from Abo on September 4th), deals with the habits and instincts of 

 solitary insects, and of this German and Finnish editions are in the 

 press, with possibly an English edition to follow. But, though ento- 

 mology was the dominant inspiration of his activities, Professor 

 Reuter, like the late W. F. Kirby, gave considerable attention to the 

 folk-lore and literature of Finland, using the tongue spoken by him 

 in conversation, which was Swedish. Indeed, a poet himself, it 

 would not be saying too much to describe him as the Fabre of the 

 North, gifted alike with exceptional powers of observation and 

 insight, and with \the language of a seer with which to adorn his 

 thoughts and mental speculations. H R B 



