Entomological Society. 9377 
cavation at the foot of an oak about a month previously; the galls were attached to 
the root of the tree, but were not in clusters, and were at a depth of four feet below 
the surface ; each gall contained two or three larve, and during the last few days five 
specimens of the perfect insect had gnawed their way out; at first a very small hole 
was visible, through which, when it had been made large enough, a mandible was 
pushed ; the insect continued its gnawing, an antenna was soon protruded, and gradu- 
ally a perfect Cynips emerged. The whole of the five specimens were females, and 
he believed that the whole brood would prove to be of that sex. These phenomena 
suggested several queries not capable of easy answer: in the first place, how does the 
Cynips make its way to the surface through the four feet of sand or earth which lies 
above it? Secondly, how does the parent manage to lay her eggs so deep in the ground ? 
Thirdly, how long are the galls in process of formation? Fourthly, it would seem 
highly probable, from the observations of foreign entomologists on allied species, that 
in Cynips aptera (to which the exhibited specimens were very nearly related if not 
identical therewith) the male comes out in the spring, and in the spring only, whereas 
here was a brood of females emerging in October. Another peculiar circumstance was 
that the flies, since their escape from the galls, had made, in the box in which they 
were confined, a web of considerable tenacity, not unlike that formed by the larve of 
certain Lepidoptera. 
Mr, F. Smith considered the specimens exhibited to be the Cynips aptera: in 
Bishop’s Wood the galls might be obtained in any quantity, and he had himself 
reared hundreds of the fly, but all the specimens were females; he had collected 
them at all times of the year, and never saw a male: so far as he was aware, a male 
Cynips (z.e. of the true genus Cynips of Hartig) had never been observed. 
Professor Westwood said that the males of Cynips were described by American 
authors ; the occurrence of an autumn brood consisting of females only had also been 
noticed, and to the phenomenon of one sex in one brood and the other in another the 
term “ dimorphism ” had been applied. The spring brood, however, was said to yield 
both males and females; the theory was that the females of the autumn brood were 
agamous, but laid eggs,—that it was a case of parthenogenesis,—but that those of the 
spring brood were fertilized in the ordinary manner by contact with the male. 
Mr. W. W. Saunders exhibited three other kinds of gall which he had found during 
a recent trip to Switzerland. The first was found on a glaucous-leaved willow, and 
occurred near the Lake of Brienz: it resembled a small fir-cone, or might even be 
likened to the flower of a Centaurea: no larve were discovered, but traces of their 
action were visible, and the cause of the excrescences was doubtless a Cynips. The 
second kind was found in July near Coire, where a dwarf and stunted species of willow 
was covered with red berries, looking like so many red currants; these also were doubtless 
due toa Cynips. The third kind was formed on the beech, and was an indurated 
conical gall, so hard as with difficulty to be cut with a knife, but nevertheless made on 
the leaf of the tree; it was hollow, with a large flat base in which the larva nestled, 
' and was found at Ragatz and at Interlaken, and in other parts of Switzerland, in July 
and August. 
Mr. Stainton exhibited a gall found on the oak near Bath, the exterior of which 
was of a woully texture and of yellowish colour. 
Mr. Stainton also exhibited copies of the twenty-one plates designed to illustrate 
Messrs. Douglas and Scott’s forthcoming volume on the British Hemiptera-Hete- 
roptera. 
WOR. SITs" 3U 
