63 



species of plume, some Noctuae, Lithosia caniola, etc. Dr. 

 Chapman noted that several plume larva; bit off the main 

 stem of the plant and fed on the consequent exuding sap. 



Mr. E. Step exhibited photographs of Morchclla crassipcs, 

 Pers., taken at Ashtead on May 26th. He believed the 

 specimen to be the var. smithiana, of which very few examples 

 have been recorded. As compared with the ordinary Morel 

 (M. csculenta), the present species lacked the symmetrical 

 conical form of the pileus, and was remarkable for the great 

 size of the cavernous cream-coloured stem. The day after 

 the meeting of the Society, at which a Morel had been 

 exhibited, his son had brought him a large flat pileus which 

 he had imagined was that of a Morel that had met with 

 serious obstruction to its emergence from the soil. On his 

 return from the Bookham Field Meeting, the same observer 

 had reported another Morel near the spot where he had 

 found the detached pileus, and an inspection next morning 

 revealed a specimen of M. crassipcs. Its height was 7 in. and 

 the diameter of the stem 3^ in. No doubt, if it had been 

 allowed to remain, it would have attained to a far greater 

 size, as it has been recorded a foot in height. 



Mr. Step also exhibited a photograph of an abnormal frog, 

 which he believed to a hybrid between Rana temporaria and 

 Bufo vulgaris. It was caught in the garden by his son, who 

 was at once struck by its unusual appearance. The texture 

 and colouring of the skin were those of a frog, but the round- 

 ness of body and limbs was that of the toad. The distance 

 between the eyes and the anterior margin of the mouth was 

 shorter than in the normal frog, and the muzzle was broad 

 and rounded like that of the toad. But the most striking 

 character was afforded by the skin, which, though soft and 

 moist, was raised into innumerable little papillae, which, 

 however, were not so broad as the warts on a toad. The 

 hind limbs had frog-like proportions, but the fore limbs had 

 the massiveness characteristic of those of the toad. Mr. 

 Step had hoped to exhibit this remarkable frog, but un- 

 fortunately it had escaped from the greenhouse where it had 

 been confined. He reminded the members that in the year 

 1893 he had exhibited an abnormal toad which had several 

 frog-like tendencies of structure, and thought the two circum- 

 stances seemed to point to an occasional cross between the 

 two species, though these were the only examples he knew of- 

 (See Abstr. " Proc. S. Lond. Ent. Soc," 1893, p. in). 



