5763 Entomological Society. 



Mr. Stainton exhibited the living larva of Hypercallia Christiernana received 

 from Switzerland. 



Mr. Janson exhibited various species of Coleoptera captured by himself in the 

 neighbourhood of London during the last month, and made the following observations 

 in reference to them : — 



" 1. Rhyncolus truncorum, Germar, Gyll. A novelty to our list, notwithstanding 

 that its name for many years there held a place ; but, as Mr. Walton has shown, the 

 insect thus designated by the late Mr. Stephens pertains to the genus Phloeophagus, 

 being the P. aeneopiceus of Schonherr. 



" Of the two species of Rhyncolus extant in British collections and enumerated by 

 Mr. Walton, the present insect is most nearly allied to R. cylindrirostris, Oliv. (ligna- 

 rius, Marshy Steph.), from which it may be at once distinguished by its more robust 

 habit, its singularly depressed eyes, whose position may be styled infero-lateral, no 

 trace of them being discernible on regarding the insect from above, and by its slender 

 tarsi. 



"2. Phloeophagus spadix, Herbst, Sch'onh., Walton. 



" 3. Jieptinus testaceus, M'uller, Hardy. 



" 4. Xantholinus glaber, Nordman, Erichson, of which the only indigenous ex- 

 ample previously known is in the cabinet of the late Mr. Kirby, in whose manuscript 

 catalogue it is denominated Gyrohypnus rotundicollis ; the insect, however, represent- 

 ing Xantholinus rotundicollis of Stephens in his collection is a small variety of X. 

 punctulatus, Fab., Eric. 



" 5. Stenus contractus, Eric, (fornicatus of Kirby's but not of Stephens' collection ; 

 basalis, Curtis.) 



"6. Homceusa acuminata, Mderkel, Kraatz, Wollaston. 



" 7. Tomicus (Bostrichus) bispinus, Ratzeburg, Bold, nee Guy on. 



" 8. Homalota confusa, Mderkel, Kraatz, Waterhouse. One of three specimens 

 taken, a few days since, in a nest of Formica fuliginosa, by my kind and assiduous 

 friend and colleague Mr. Edwin Shepherd." 



Mr. Janson likewise exhibited a box of Coleoptera just received from Rannoch, 

 where they had been recently taken by Mr. Foxcroft. The species most noteworthy 

 were Ampedus tristis, Rhyncolus ater, both sexes of Dictyopterus Aurora, Elaphrus 

 uliginosus, Anchomenus Ericeti, and Calathus micropterus. 



Mr. Smith brought for distribution amongst the members some series of named 

 specimens of British ants, and exhibited some cocoons said to have been found in the 

 debris of a hornet's nest, and from one of which his correspondent assured him a male 

 hornet had emerged; on examination, however, it was discovered that the remaining 

 cocoons contained Bombi. 



Mr. Wilkinson observed that he had tested a portion of the cloth-like substance 

 exhibited at the last Meeting, which was said to be the production of some insect; 

 the result of his experiments, however, proved it to be of undoubted vegetable 

 origin. 



Mr. Westwood called attention to the continuation of Sepp's 4 Nederlansche 

 Insecten,' the publication of which had been resumed in Holland : he was happy 

 to say that entomologists appeared to be going energetically to work in that country, 

 the recently published parts of the ' Transactions of the Netherlands Entomological 

 Society' containing several excellent memoirs. 



