March 1, 1865.] 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



71 



Parasites op Cabbage Butterely. — I have 



always understood that the cabbage-wonn eventu- 

 ally undergoes the transformations common to 

 the insect tribe. Now, in the autumn of 1864 I 

 observed some dark-giecn caterpillars, marbled on 

 the sides with yellow spots and streaks, making 

 great havoc of some Avintcr greens in my garden. I 

 squeezed one, by accident, and there exuded a 

 number of small cocoons about the size of those 

 belonging to the ants' nest. Not long after this, I 

 found some of these larvse climbing my window- 

 panes. They deposited small heaps of these cocoons, 

 protecting them with a covering of yellow silk, the 

 caterpillars then, without changing to a chrysalis, 

 died, being merely nothing but skin. Are these 

 cocoons those of the Ichneumon fly? — T. H.— — 

 The ily in question is one of the Braconidm, tribe 

 IchneumonUes ; it is the Ichneumon glomerafus of 

 Linnseus, and the Microgaster glomeratiis of modern 

 authors.— i^. JF. 



The Smooth Si^rAKE Again. — In reply to 

 S. L.N. S.— The following is Dr. Gunther's de- 

 scription of the smooth snake {Coronella Icevis) : — 

 " Scales in twenty-one rows ; anal bifid ; upper 

 labials, seven._ Brown. Back with two, sometimes 

 confluent, series of irregularly rounded dark spots. 

 Hinder maxillary tooth smooth." It more resembles 

 the viper than the snake in general appearance, but 

 differs in the number of plates on the head, is com- 

 monly smaller in size, with a double row of spots 

 down the back, and not a single zigzag line as in the 

 viper." 



On Behalf of a Salamander. — Will you oblige 

 a particular friend of mine, a salamander, by informing 

 me what would be most likely to please his eftship's 

 dainty palate ? I became acquainted with this 

 gentleman some six months ago, and from that time 

 to the present he appears to have lost his appetite, 

 possibly because I dragged him from_ the society of 

 his friends, and have immured him in an aquarium 

 too small to please his hi^h notions of his former 

 estate ; possibly because I have not tempted him 

 with a sufficiently delicious morsel, though I should 

 have thought a reclierche blood-worm, dangling before 

 his uselessly large mouth, would have satisfied any 

 reptile. He ekes out a monotonous existence, en- 

 throned in a small cash-bowl filled with moss, which 

 floats on the top of my aquarium, looking down 

 upon fish, leeches, his cousins the newts, a tortoise, 

 &c., with the most supreme indifference, except that 

 occasionally, when disposed for a spree, he mounts 

 the back of the latter for a ride round his diminished 

 domains. The tortoise, on these occasions, seems 

 fuUy alive to his inferiority, and submits to bemade 

 a horse of for his highness the salamander, without 

 so much as a murmur. I am the more puzzled to 

 know what to make of his digestive organs, or the 

 want of them, as he not only lives upon nothing, 

 but actually gets fat upon it. His forty_ days and 

 forty nights' fast has been repeated five times over, 

 and I am beginning to get anxious about '/the 

 subject of our memoir." Perhaps you will kindly 

 inquhe of any of his family with whom you may 

 meet, of what their favourite dish consists, as I 

 should be sorry to be the cause of his untimely 

 death resulting from my inattention, and thus bring 

 upon my friend the fate of Timothy Daly. — Dijtiscus 

 Marginalis. 



Aquaria and Pernery Combined. — I shall be 

 obliged by information upon this — The aquarium to 

 have a glass cover, the ferns placed under it on 

 floating cork j^lauds ; what would be a good assort- 



ment, not only of ferns, but of any other suitable 

 plants, if possible bearing flowers? It is said all 

 the species of lycopodia will do well in this situa- 

 tion, but there may be many others. What descrip- 

 tion of growing moss or lichen would be suitable to 

 form a ground, those plants requiring least soil 

 to be preferred, also where the varieties recom- 

 mended may be procured? Will the glass cover 

 require apertures for ventilation? There 13 a film- 

 like spider's web interlacing the plants in the 

 aquarium— what is this ? The same has been seen 

 in rivers. Is there any cure for the fungus that 

 grows on the fish in the aquarium ? — E. S. 



Wasps in London.— Your correspondent J. E. 

 inquires_ how it is there are no wasps in London. 

 I live wathin four and a quarter miles of the Bank, 

 so there is no doubt as to whether I live in London. 

 In front of my house there is a field in which I 

 destroyed four wasps' nests last year ; so tormented 

 were we with them, that at any time during the 

 hot months, from five to twenty together might be 

 found in one room. After this I hope J. E. will not 

 imagine there are no wasps in London. — C. S. 



Barnes. [We saw plenty of wasps in London 



last year, some within three minutes' walk of Charing 

 Cross.— ^f/. S. a.'] 



Ornithological Query.— Will any of your 

 readers, acquainted witli Africa and South America, 

 inform me whither the hirundines of those countries 

 migrate, according as the rainy season aft'ects each 

 country respectively ? I am induced to ask this 

 question from reading, as follows, in Dr. Living- 

 stone's South Africa : — " During the first week of 

 June, 1855, in latitude 10° S., 19° W., saw many 

 goat-suckers, swifts, and different kinds of swallows ;" 

 and again, during the last week of December, 1852, 

 " large flocks of swifts were observed flying over 

 the plains of Kuruman, S. lat. 28°, long. E. I 

 estimated one stream alone of these birds (on their 

 migratory route ?) at 4,000 and over — can these be 

 the swifts that beset Europe ? " _ Mr. W. H. Bates, 

 although seven, years travelling in equatorial South 

 America, only once names sioaUoics as being seen by 

 him, though so keen a aaturalist, and this occurs at 

 p. 239, where he says : " On the 3rd January, 1854, 

 a kind of second summer set in at Villa Nova, 2° — 3° 

 S. lat., when a species of sicallow, of a hroion colour, 

 with a short square tail (Cotyle), made its appear- 

 ance in great numbers, and built their nests in holes 

 of the banh on which the village is built." Now, 

 Prince L. Bonaparte, in his beautiful work on 

 Ornithology, enumerates among his 63 varieties of 

 Hirundines, 10 distinct varieties for South America 

 alone, and seven varieties as peculiar to South Africa. 

 Where do all these hirundines migrate to, in each 

 continent, considering that they cannot overpass 

 that belt of intense rain (from 400 to 500 miles 

 broad) that oscillates, according to the sun's decli- 

 nation, from north to south, from between lat. N. 

 15°, and lat. S. 5° ? I cannot but think that these 

 southern hu'undines, take those of India, Australia, 

 and the Eastern Hemisphere generally (as do the 

 parakeets), all move north or sou.th ivithin their 

 respective countries only. What say your travelled 

 naturalist readers ? — H. E. A. 



Cutting Sections of Wood.— J. F. C, in- 

 quires what time of the year is the best for cutting 

 sections of wood for the microscope ? As green 

 wood is not employed for this purpose, we see no 

 reason why any one period of the year should be 

 preferable to another. 



