Mat 1, 1SG5.] 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



113 



ENTOMOLO&Y. 



Entomological Society op London. — The 

 council arc making strenuous efforts to augment the 

 number of their members and subscribers, so as to 

 enable them to publish more of tlie valuable scien- 

 tific material in their hands. In this effort we wish 

 them entire success. 



The Deivek-ant. — Eire will frighten almost any 

 creature ; but it has no terrors for the driver-ant, 

 which will dash at a glowing coal, fix its jaws in 

 the burning mass, and straightway shrivel i\]i in the 

 heat. — Homes without Hands. 



Wasps scaece in London. — When we lived in 

 Walworth, we scarcely ever saw a wasp in or about 

 the house ; but here on Denmark Hill they are tole- 

 rably plentiful. I think the fact of their extreme 

 scarcity in central London may be accounted for by 

 their seldom going more than two miles from their 

 nests. "Wasps may be abundant enough at Barnes, 

 and yet quite unknown "in London." — W. B. Tate. 



Hybeknation oe Elies.— On the 9th of October, 

 1S63, 1 ascended a disused semaphore in Surrey for 

 the purpose of enjoying the view from the top. On 

 it was a flag-pole notched for climbing, like the 

 bears' pole in Regent's Park, and covered with red 

 baize. In order to climb this pole, I took hold of 

 it, when out tumbled, l!u"ough holes in the baize, 

 and at the bottom of it, scores of bluebottles. I 

 conceive that they must iiave got there to pass 

 the winter in a state of torpidity, and probably 

 T. H. E.'s were induced to leave their hyberna- 

 cula prematurely by the heat of his rooms. — //"". B. 

 Tate. 



Development op Buttekfly- wings. — Mr. Side- 

 bottom, in a paper read at the Literary and Philo- 

 sophical Society, Manchester, January 16th, said that 

 the great and rapid increase of size in the wings of 

 theLepidoptera, soon after the insect emerges from 

 the chrysalis, is caused by air, taken in through the 

 spiracles, being sent into the vessels of the wings ; 

 the membrane is expanded in consequence, and the 

 scales, Vr-hich were before packed under each other 

 as closely as possible, arc made to slide out until 

 they remain in the fully-developed wing like the 

 tUes of a roof. He exhibited preserved specimens 

 of the currant moth and the tiger-moth with the 

 wings, both in their small and in their expanded 

 state ; also a coloured sketch of one of them ; and 

 it was seen that in the unexpanded state the wings 

 lie flat without any folding; and all their markings 

 are a correct representation in miniature of what 

 tliey ultimately become. — The Beader. 



The Treasury has authorized the expenditure of 

 £3,000 for printing tlie Boyal Society's "Index io 

 the Scientinc Periodical Literature of the Nineteenth 

 Century." 



What do Cuickets eat ?— I am afraid that my 

 own experience will not lead me to regard crickets 

 with a favourable eye, if I look at the ^lseful rather 

 than the ornamental. I have by me at the present 

 moment a pair of slippers, the soles of which are 

 very much gnawed by the crickets. They must 

 plead guilty, for they were caught in the act. A 

 young friend of mine can tell you dolefully that 

 they do not confine their ravages to old boots. — B. B. 



A Wasp and its Victim. — I once witnessed a 

 combat between a was^o and a yellow undcrwing 

 moth. The wasp espied the moth in a small out- 

 house, andimmediately attacked it; the moth, with 

 no offensive weapons, struggled bravely for nearly 

 lialf-an-hour. At last, however, the wasp killed it ; 

 it immediately severed the head and body from the 

 tail, and flew off with it ; it returned after about ten 

 minutes for the tail, wil h which it fled away too ; it 

 did not take the wings. — -/. J. M. 



Ants Stoking Grain. — It is disputed by some 

 whether ants do carry off grain and store it ; but the 

 following incident will show that they do so, and to 

 a considerable extent. At the side of my house at 

 Zante there was a threshing-floor, or rather the 

 paved space was converted temporarily into one, a 

 pole having been fixed in the centre, to which horses 

 were attached, and driven round and round to 

 trample out the corn. A pile of wheat was left here 

 unthreshcd for a few days. In the meantime tlie 

 ants committed depredations upon it, and, on one of 

 their nests being opened, two good-sized tin cans- 

 ful of grain were found deposited in it. — J. J. Lake, 

 in Athenawn. 



Killing Insects por the Cabinet.— Years ago 

 I advocated cyanide of potassium for killing all 

 insects, or rather (if good, and easy setting be an 

 object) for stupifying them as imniediatcly as by 

 chloroform, after wliich tlicy may be killed with 

 oxalic acid if lepidopterous, &c., or by boiling if 

 coleopterous. A small fragment Avrapped in blotting- 

 paper, and placed under a perforated-card false- 

 bottom in a wide-mouthed bottle, soon renders the 

 enclosed air more deadly than chloroform ; whilst 

 no expense or difficulty attends the use of this sub- 

 stance, which, for photograpliical purposes, may now 

 be met with everywhere ; also, when combined witli 

 old laurel-leaves, no stilFening will be found to 

 ensue, even when insects are suffered to die, and 

 remain all night in the bottle. My owni plan with 

 Lepidoptera is to pill-box them, and then, as shortly 

 after as possible, to open the pill-box over the wide- 

 mouthed bottle containing the cyanide, into which 

 the moths almost immediately fall, when they may 

 be taken out, stabbed with oxalic acid, and set or 

 left as preferred. By this means females maybe 

 also left to deposit their eggs or not, without dilii- 

 culty. — Zr. 1). Crotch, Wcsto)i-super-2Lare. 



