THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 189 



food derived from cereals, whether barley, oats or wheat, 

 which is the first necessity of life, and I would gladly 

 counteract this tendency if in nay power to do so. The life- 

 history of this insect is extremely simple. The parent 

 female is furnished with a long, a very long oviduct, which 

 she introduces between the valves of the calyx of the wheat, 

 and then lays her eggs at the very bottom — the inner base of 

 the inflorescence. These eggs soon hatch, and the young 

 grubs feed on the concealed parts of the inflorescence, and 

 unquestionably preclude the possibility of that particular 

 grain ever attaining maturity. The grubs are of a bright 

 orange colour, and may often be found in little clusters of 

 four or five between the valves of the calyx, sometimes 

 naked, and at others encased in a very thin silken pellicle 

 attached to the valves, or to a grain of wheat. They fall to 

 the ground when full fed, and turn to chrysalids on or under 

 the surface of the ground, and do not assume the fly state 

 until the end of May or first week in June of the year 

 following. — E. Newman ; York Grove, Peckham, July 30. 

 — From the ^ Field'* Newspaper. 



Abstract of the Proceedings of the Entotnological Society, 



July 4, 1870. 



Oxyptilus Icetus. — The Hon. T. De Grey exhibited a series 

 of Oxyptilus laetus (Zeller), from Brandon, Suffolk. 



Galls on Ammophila arundinacea. — Mr. Albert Miiller 

 exhibited some galls on Ammophila arundinacea, found last 

 autumn by Mr. J. Traill about two miles north of Aberdeen ; 

 they occurred rather abundantly on stunted specimens, one 

 gall on each plant. The gall consisted of the imbricate 

 closely-sheathed leaves of a top-shoot, which contained a 

 single longitudinal narrow cell, from two to three lines long, 

 the upper part of which was pierced by the escaping insect. 

 The insect, however, had not yet been detected. 



Cynips ramuli on Oak. — The Secretary exhibited a large 

 woolly gall of the oak and a number of living specimens of 

 Cynips ramuli which had emerged therefrom. The gall was 

 found on the 24th of June, at Idsworth, near Horndean, by 

 Sir J. Clarke Jervoise, Bart., who wrote respecting it as 

 follows : — " My attention was yesterday called to what 1 



