338 © Mr A. E. Shipley, On Lethrus cephalotes, —_[Feb. 25, 
distinguished from the female by the possession of two thorns on 
the prothorax. 
The habits of the beetle are as follows :—The imago creeps 
out of the earth in the spring, usually some time in May, the 
female is then fertilized and at once sets about preparing a nest 
for her eggs and larvae. She ascends a vine stock and carefully 
selecting one of the younger leaves, she bites through the mid 
rib, on both sides, and then folds round the lamina of the leaf 
into a rough roll. This is secured by a sticky secretion. Then 
more leaves are added until the structure assumes the appearance 
of a very loosely rolled cigar. In this roll of leaves four to six 
dirty-white eggs are laid, each about 1 mm. long. The larvae 
which hatch out from the eggs are yellowish-white grubs, with 
a brownish head and plentifully supplied with hairs. They live 
four or five weeks in the roll of leaves, and then descend to the 
ground, in which they turn to chrysalids. There is no opening 
in the cigar-shaped roll, as after the eggs are laid another leaf is 
folded over them. 
The chrysalid stage lasts about a week and the whole de- 
velopment about sixty days. The beetles which emerge from 
the cocoons about the end of August pass the winter under- 
ground. 
In addition to the harm caused by the female rolling up 
the young leaves, much damage is caused by the beetles eating 
the leaves. They usually prefer to attack vines which are not 
quite healthy. In 1872 they caused so much damage to the 
vineyards in the neighbourhood of Neusiedler See in Hungary, 
that scarcely an uninjured vine leaf was left in that district. 
The only method of combating this pest is to collect and 
destroy the nests, which can be very easily seen. 
III. Chaetocnema basalis. 
A collection of minute beetles, together with a letter from 
the Deputy Conservator of Forests in the Tharrawaddy Division, 
Burma, describing their habits, was forwarded to me by the 
Inspector-General of Indian Forests, last November. The beetles 
were all of one species ; they were preserved in spirits and were 
in an excellent state of preservation. 
I am indebted to Mr W. F. Blandford for the identification 
of the species and for a careful comparison of them with the 
single specimen of the same species in the national collection at 
South Kensington. Mr Blandford identifies the beetle as Chae- 
tocnema basalis; a description of a member of this species from 
India by Mr J. 8. Baly occurs in the Transactions of the Ento- 
