THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 173 



with, and as it will eat and destroy green maize, potatoes, 

 tomatoes, strawberries, raspberries, peaches, plums, cherries, 

 apricots, grapes, capsicums (in fruit), and remained unhurt by 

 an appUcation of pure fusel oil forced on to it by means of a 

 spray pump, its omnivorous propensities are by no means to be 

 despised or treated lightly. It has been stated to me that the 

 same insect made its appearance about two years since, and, so I 

 am informed, did great damage to grapes, &c., the juices being 

 sucked out, and the fruit then withered, and remained for some time 

 on the trees. The remarkable part of the matter seems to me to be 

 the question asked, from whence have they come and in such 

 millions ? I have been collecting insects for upwards of twenty- 

 five years, and do not recollect having seen more than perhaps a 

 dozen specimens during the whole of that time. 



The remarks that have been made by some persons concerning 

 this bug have, no doubt, caused much mirth, as only a short time 

 since someone made the extraordinary discovery that this insect 

 was the " true " anthracnose of the vine, while another declared it 

 to be of spontaneous generation caused by the excessively moist 

 season. It is, however, a fact that the insect at present has a range 

 of nearly i,ooo miles — viz., from South Gippsland to Brisbane. 

 The drawings which I show here this evening have been made 

 by my friend, Mr. C. C. Brittlebank, of this club, and to whom I 

 have also entrusted the drawing of the plates by which the 

 "Handbook of the Destructive Insects of Victoria," now in 

 course of preparation, will be illustrated. 



PRELIMINARY ACCOUNT OF A NEW AUSTRALIAN 

 PERIPATUS. 



By Arthur Dendy, M.Sc, F.L.S. 

 A FEW months ago I had the pleasure of reading before the Field 

 Naturalists' Club, a short account of atrip to Walhalla,* in which I 

 described some of the Land Planarians met with. As a result of 

 this paper one of our members, Mr. H. R. Hogg, began to collect 

 Planarians for me at Macedon. I requested him to look out also 

 for Feripahis, and, with a view to so doing, he carefully examined 

 some of my specimens of P. leuckartii. Mr. Hogg has not been 

 long in meeting with success in his researches into the cryptozoic 

 fauna of Macedon, and a short time ago he kindly brought me a 

 number of beautiful Planarians, all alive, and five specimens of 

 PeripaUis, two alive and three in spirits. 



The Planarians I hope to describe at a future date : the Peti- 

 patus I propose to deal with in the present communication. 

 Although all small, the specimens proved of the greatest interest, 



* " Zcologica] Notes on a Trip to Walhalla," Victorian Naturalist, December, 



