2406 Quadrupeds. 



the members of the Entomological Society, and if so where I could read any particu- 

 lars respecting it, and if any mode of eradication has been suggested, as, once in a 

 cellar (the enemy being inclosed in the bottles, as it were), I cannot conceive any 

 mode of getting rid of it without disturbing the wine, thus making the remedy as bad 

 as the disease. When the corks have been the most eaten, I have noticed the neck 

 of the bottle about the cork has been covered with a very tender ropy web. As from 

 reading the notices of Cryptophagus, in the works I have named, dampness in cellars 

 seems implied, I will just observe that my cellar is perfectly dry, and the corks eaten 

 quite as much in upper bins as in those on the ground. — W. Atkinson." 



The larvae were evidently Lepidopterous, — and Mr. Westwood considered them 

 to be identical with those exhibited some time since by Mr. E. Doubleday, from 

 which Mr. Stephens bred a specimen of Gracillaria V-flava. Various suggestions 

 were made as to the means of destroying the insects ; and Mr. Bedell expressed 

 his belief that the common food of the larvae of Gracillaria V-flava is a species of 

 Fungus. 



Mr. Westwood exhibited drawings of a remarkable species of insect infesting the 

 peach-tree in peach-houses, and evidently allied to, if not one of, the Aphidse. These 

 insects, apparently in the pupa state, were found in small silken cocoons, and in form 

 resemble an Aphis, are covered with down, have the legs free, are active, but appa- 

 rently have no mouth. 



Mr. Westwood, on behalf of Mr. Bond, exhibited a box of Australian insects, 

 collected by Mr. A. Barlow on the Mundarra River, four hundred miles north of 

 Sydney, amongst which were a new species of Carenum, some fine Pambori and Ca- 

 losomata, a new Cerapterus and many other rare species. 



Mr. White exhibited a specimen of one of the Rhynchophora from Port Natal, 

 the beak of which was fixed in some solid substance, from which apparently the insect 

 had been unable to extract it, and from the scutellum of which grew a fungus. He 

 also exhibited a specimen of a Cerapterus from Port Natal, probably a variety of C. 

 Smithii, without the white spot ; and gave a short account of some new Cetoniadoe 

 and Hydrocanthari. 



Mr. Westwood read descriptions of a new genus of Helopidae, for which he pro- 

 posed the name of Prophanes ; and of two new species of Carenum. — E. D. 



Reasoning Power in the Dog. — The following instance of the reasoning powers of 

 the dog happened some time ago to come under my father's notice : it bears a striking 

 similarity to one mentioned by Mr. Atkinson in his paper on " Reason and Instinct." 

 My father was one day out shooting with a setter bitch : he shot at a hare, which he 

 wounded, but did not kill: the setter instantly gave chase ; Puss jumped an adjoining 

 brook, and was quickly followed by the setter, which overtook her in a little time and 

 1 nought her dead to the side of the brook ; but here was a difficulty, — the brook, al- 

 though not very wide, could not be jumped with the hare ; but Doll was not without 

 an expedient : she dropped the hare into the stream, then ran some yards down it, 

 sprung in, caught the hare in her mouth as it floated down, and swam with it to the 

 other side, where my father took it from her. — Edward Peacock, Jun. ; Messingham, 

 Kirton Lindsay, Lincolnshire, March, 1849. 



