The Zoologist— October, 1866. 463 



my boat for the nijjht alongside a small clearing in the low-lying traci of country 

 forming a part of the Iiawadi Estuary (Delta), east of the Rassein River, where the 

 water was salt, and the entire country not more than a foot, if so much, above the flood- 

 level. Night had closed in, and my servant, who brought in the tea, asked me to step 

 out of my tent and see the fireflies, which, he said, he had never seen the like of 

 before. On stepping out of the tent, a truly beautiful sight presented itself. In front 

 was the broad and deep river sweeping on, with its indistinctly seen back-ground of 

 primaeval forest on its opposite bank. Around me was the recently-formed clearing, 

 with its two or three huis and my own camp, as the sole proof of man's occupancy, for 

 miles aud miles, hut, for all the wildness and almost desolation of the scene, the bank 

 on which I stood was a glorious spectacle, and those acquainted with the class of 

 native servants will well understand that it must have been at once unusual and 

 beautiful indeed to rivet the attention of a listless khitmutgar! The bushes over- 

 hanging the water were one mass of fireflies, though, from the confined space available 

 for them on low shrubs, the numbers may not have been actually more than are often 

 congregated in Bengal. The light of this great body of insects was given out, as 

 I Lave said, in rythmic flashes, and, for a second or two, lighted up the bushes in a 

 beautiful manner; heightened, no doubt, by the sudden relapse into darkness which 

 followed each flash. These are the facts of the case (and, I may add, it was towards 

 the end of the year), and the only suggestion I would throw out, to account for the 

 unusual method of luminous emanation, is that the close congregation of large 

 numbers of insects , from the small space afi'orded by the bushes in question, may have 

 given rise to the synchronous emission of the flash,- by the force of imitation or 

 sympathy. Mr. Montgomery, of the Survey Department here, also fully corroborates 

 the habit of our Pegu fireflies simultaneously emitting their light, but adds he has 

 only remarked it under conditions similar to those described above, in low swampy 

 ground. It still remains, therefore, to be decided if the insect is different from the 

 ordinary one, or if, as I am inclined to think, the simuUaneity is produced by 

 sympathy and great crowding of individuals." — W. Theobald, jun. 



Mr. M'Lachlan mentioned that the genus of HydropsychidEC (Trichoptera) described 

 by him in the 'Transactions' (third series, v. 270), under the name of Sciops, was 

 identical with the Hydromanicus of Brauer (Verb. K. K. zool.-botan. Gesellschaft in 

 Wien, XV. 420), which had priority over Sciops, so that the latter name must sink. 

 The two species described by Mr. M'Lachlan were, however, both distinct from the 

 Hydromanicus irroratus of Dr. Brauer. 



Mr. Janson exhibited a small collection of Jamaican insects, the produce of the 

 first three weeks of Mr. C. P. Gloyne's residence near George Town : amongst a few 

 Hemipiera, an Emesa was the most interesting; and amongst the Coleoptera, an 

 Epitragus, a Charactus, Hebtstola, Desmophora, Notosus, Helops, &c. 



The Secretary read a further instalment of "Notes on the Buprestidae of South 

 Australia," communicated by Mr. C. A. Wilson, of Adelaide. 



Mr. Pascoe read the following description of a new genus of Tmesisterninae: — 



"The Queensland insect described below is closely allied to Spintheria, from the 

 opposite land of New Caledonia. It is exceedingly interesting as being a second form 

 of a group which, almost excluded from Australia, abounds in New Guinea and the 

 Celebes (Mr. Wallace's collection alone contains nearly a hundred species), and is 



