157 
character found in all the Portunide, and in some genera of 
other families, though systematists have apparently regarded 
it as of little classificatory value. Mr. Step considered it 
had greater value than was generally supposed, and brought 
the genera Pilumnus and Pirimela into closer relationship 
with the Portunide than with the Cancridz, where at 
present placed. Mr. W. Garstang had recently shown how 
the spaces between these teeth allow the water to be filtered 
through the superincumbent sand, and to pass between the 
flexed cheliped and the carapace to the inhalent openings of 
the branchial chamber without allowing sand to pass and 
injure the branchiz. Such a character, correlated, as it 
is, with the presence of spines on the cheliped, which fix 
the distance the latter must stand away from the under 
part of the carapace, points to a common ancestor for the 
genera Pilumnus, Pivimela, Portumnus, Portunus, and Bathy- 
nectes. 
Mr. Step also exhibited the variety of Portunus marmoreus, 
or holsatus, described and figured on pages 38 and 39. 
Mr. Robert Adkin exhibited a series of Epione parallelaria 
(= vespertaria) from Sutherland, where the species was 
found in some numbers by Mr. W. Salvage in 1892. 
Also examples of Abraxas grossulariata in which the mark- 
ings of the fore-wings, which are usually of a bright yellow, 
were of a deep dull ochreous. The specimens were sent to 
him by the Rev. J. Greene, of Bristol, who had reared them 
from larvee found on Euonymus. 
On behalf of Rev. J. Greene, of Clifton, Mr. Adkin ex- 
hibited some seventy drawings of varieties of Abraxas &vOos- 
sulariata bred during the last six years, and read the following 
remarks by Mr. Greene upon the specimens represented :— 
““ With three exceptions (marked by a dot .) the drawings 
now exhibited represent a portion of the varieties bred by 
. myself during the last six seasons, 7.¢. 1892-7. I have 
seventy or eighty others, hardly inferior to these. It may be 
thought that the exhibition of the insects themselves would 
have been more satisfactory. No doubt, but I was not pre- 
pared to run the risk. As to the drawings, I can truly say 
that I have endeavoured, to the utmost of my power, to 
accurately represent the size, markings, and coloration, &c., 
of the specimens from which they were copied. 
‘Prior to 1892 I had never seen more than two or three 
dozen larvze in a season, but in the spring of that year I had 
the good fortune to discover their favourite food, viz. the 
common Euonymus. I will state (approximately) here the 
