7024 Insects. 



Monograph of Tenthredinidee much wanted. — I wish some entomologist would take 

 upon bira to monograph our Teuthrediuidae, as Mr. Smith has done the bees and 

 Fossores; it is a work much wanted. At present this family appears in the utmost 

 Confusion, no one venturing to give an opinion for fear be might not be correct. 

 Perhaps Mr. Smith would be good enough to take up this next-of-kin to his favourites 

 the Aculeala^ as I am sure his pen and pencil would do us an infinite service by so 

 doing. — E. Parjitt ; Museum, Taunton, February 4, 1860. 



Description of a new Species of Hemerobius. — The following is a description of a 

 species I look here last aulumn : — 



Hemebobius Hagenii, Mihi. 



H. Testaceo-fliivescens. Antennis fusco-annulatis. Oculis nigris; femoribus et 

 tibiis pallidis; tarsisque rufescentibus. Alis hyalinis, punctis fuscis sparsis ; 

 stigmatibus aurantiacus. 

 Long. corp. 2 lin. Exp. alar. G\ lin. 



Pale testaceous. Eyes black. Antennae pale yellowish, rather short and thick, 

 annulated to the tip with dark testaceous rings. Wings pale testaceous-yellow; the 

 nervures slightly darker and doited with brown ; a few larger blotches of the same 

 colour towards the apex of the wing; stigmata forming a bright orange blotch, very 

 conspicuous. Posterior wings paler than tbe anterior, and without tbe brown dots, 

 but having a bright orange blotch on tbe anterior margin, corresponding with the 

 siigmala of the anterior wings. All the wings beautifully iridescent. Legs pale 

 yellow; the ungues dark ferruginous. — Id. 



Ants' Nests and their Inhabitants.— When I was in the habit of visiting Ran- 

 uoch'and similar places in the far Norlh,— where these things grow woiiderlully 

 large, — their investigation for beetles was not then so fashionable as it is now, or I 

 might possibly have swelled the present list ; in short 1 did not know that there was 

 such a lapis OTir(e)abilis underneath them, and the consequence was, my s^earch only 

 extended to tbe procuring the larvae of Cetonia lenea. The Germans, I believe, were 

 the first to risk tliemselves in a colony of this kind, and to proclaim to the 

 entomological world the wonders they had met with. Tbeir antecedents soon 

 procured hands as bold amongst us, and, thanks to their exertions, our lists soon 

 showed the good they had done. I con less it is rather a startling thing to come upon 

 an ant's nest, about six feet in diameter by say eighteen inches in height, literally 

 covered with a heaving blacklead-coloured mass, making a continual little crackling 

 noise; after having examined them attentively for a little while, you next naturally 

 begin to look at the ground on which you are stdnding, and also to look all around 

 you, and you see that although these ants are not so crowded as on the nesl, yet they 

 are there by hundreds, and that during the short time you have stood watching them 

 many have found an opportunity of examining the watch-chain at your waistcoat- 

 pocket ; and others — with^a more hidden meaning— have crawled up the legs of your 

 trowsers : the reasons for their doing so you will find by-and-bye. But to the ants. 

 There is no hope of obtaining the beetles, except by plunging through that living 

 mass and lifting away a portion of the nest, and so you must first spread a sheet of 



