Entomological Society. 8923 
The following addition by purchase was also announced :—Kiesenwetter, H. von, 
* Naturgeschichte der Insecten Deutschlands.’ Erste Abtheilg. Vol. iv. Part 4. 
New Member. 
Herr G. Semper, of Altona, was ballotted for and elected a Foreign Member. 
Alteration of Bye-Laws. 
A requisition, presented to the President and Council, signed by six Members, was 
read; and it was announced that, in compliance therewith, a Special General Meeting 
would be hel on the 25th of January, 1864, at 7 p. M., for the consideration of certain 
alterations in the Bye-Laws specified in the Requisition, and which were taken as read 
to the Meeting. 
Exhibitions, §c. 
The Secretary read a communication from the Lords Commissioners of the 
Admiralty, enclosing a copy of a circular letter from the Governor of St. Helena, 
respecting the ravages committed in that island by white ants. It was therein stated 
that the insects were, it is supposed, accidentally introduced from the coast of Guinea 
about twenty years since; that almost every dwelling, store or shed in Jamestown, 
containing nearly 4000 inhabitants, has been seriously injured by them, involving, in 
many instances, complete ruin and abandonment, and imperiling the lives of large 
numbers of the poorer classes, who are still living in houses of doubtful security: the 
Governor was especially anxious for detailed information as to the most successful 
mode of finding the ants’ nests and effectually destroying those receptacles, and as to 
the description of timber which has proved to be the least susceptible of injury from 
the insect, and the average market price of that timber at per cubic foot. 
Gen. Sir J. Hearsey, after detailing some of his own experiences in connexion with 
white ants in India, said that the nests must be sought in the plains, for if once the ants 
effected a lodgment in the walls of a house, the walls themselves must be taken down 
before the insects could be eradicated. He thought the best preventative of their 
attacks was to steep the timber, before building, in a solution of quick-lime, and co1n- 
pletely saturate it therewith; whilst store-boxes, furniture, and small articles should 
be painted or coated over with a solution of corrosive sublimate. 
Mr. E. W. Robinson said that, on the Indian railways, the plan was to make the 
sleepers of kyanized timber, i.e. timber to which a solution of creosote had been 
applied; it was, however, found insufficient merely to dip the wood or coat it over 
with the solution, but the whole block must be impregnated with the creosote, which, 
in fact was forced through the timber by the application of hydraulic pressure. 
Mr. Bates said that the houses on the banks of the Amazon were not much 
infested with white ants, which he attributed, in a great measure, to the use of a very 
hard wood, called Acapu: it was the habit to rest store-hoxes, &c., on sleepers or 
cylindrical pieces of that wood, which in many cases afforded sufficient protection. 
When the white ants had effected an entry into the walls (which in the Amazon 
country were principally composed of upright posts, with cross laths, filled up with 
mud, and covered with lime or cement), he had found it an unfailing remedy to fill 
up the holes in the walls with arsenical soap; pure oxide of arsenic might be used, 
but that of course was attended with danger: the arsenical soap was cheap, and 
might be diluted with water, and boxes, &c., washed over with the solution. The 
