Insects. 5829 



creeping things, to the great delight of my friend, who believed that they were one and 

 all lepidopterous. On inspecting our prize with a lantern I found that beyond a per- 

 fect swarm of wasps there was scarcely a living thing. My friend, however, was not 

 to be deceived, and, observing something creeping up the umbrella, he seized it in his 

 hand, exclaiming, " Here we are : I've got one ! " The next instant a yell of agony 

 apprized me of what had occurred. I hope others will be more fortunate, but my 

 friend and I had quite enough of ivy-hunting for one night. We were quite covered 

 with the " woppses." — T. Vaughan Roberts ; Osiveslry, October 13, 1857. 



Sirex Juvencus and the Bullets. — The French papers have lately reported that a 

 great number of bullets have been found with cylindrical holes drilled in them, and 

 that the said phenomenon, having been submitted to scientific men, these holes have 

 been identified as the work of an insect, which has been actually found in some of 

 them, and that the insect has been pronounced by entomologists to be Sirex Juvencus. 

 Whatever may have been the fact in a solitary instance, no entomologist will give the 

 insect credit for preferring the mineral to the vegetable world, and for feeding on bul- 

 lets in preference to deal. I have met with two or three instances in which Callidium 

 Bajulus had absolutely gnawed its way through the sheet-lead covering a roof; but 

 this I imagine to be nothing more than the exemplification of the energy displayed, 

 by men and animals in general, to escape a prison house. — Edward Newman. 



Characters of Zupkium olens of Latreille, drawn from a single Specimen found near 

 London. — Head exserted, separated from the prothorax by a distinct but short and 

 very narrow neck, rounded posteriorly, intensely black, brilliantly glabrous ; clypeus, 

 mouth, palpi and antennae ferruginous ; the maxillary palpi quite as long as the head, 

 the terminal joint long, slender, slightly incrassated exteriorly and obliquely truncate; 

 antennae long and slender, the basal joint stouter than the rest, quite as long as the 

 head, and perfectly concolorous. Prothorax rather wider than the head, cordate, the 

 posterior margin narrowed, truncate, the angles acute and slightly salient, the disk 

 very finely and continently punctured, and having a wide median longitudinal depres- 

 sion ; the lateral margins narrowly reflexed ; the colour ferruginous. Elytra rather 

 wider than the head, depressed; they have nine wide, shallow and somewhat incon- 

 spicuous striae, and are uniformly covered with very minute confluent punctures; the 

 lateral margins are narrowly reflexed, and in the groove caused by the flexure are about 

 ten large deep punctures, half of them situate near the humeral angle, and the other 

 half near the outer angle of the slightly sinuous truncate apex : the colour of the elytra 

 is dusky brown, with a slightly iridescent tinge, a large, bright ferruginous patch oc- 

 cupying the base of each, and a third smaller and nearly circular patch or spot of the 

 same colour occupying the apical extremity of the suture. All the legs are ferrugi- 

 nous. The length of the specimen, exclusive of the antennae, is four-tenths of an inch, 

 and the breadth one-tenth. It will be seen from this description that the insect does 

 not agree with Fairmaire's characters; indeed, it differs so materially as at first to 

 induce a belief that a species new to Science had been discovered ; but on compari- 

 son with European examples in the British Museum no doubt remains as to the iden- 

 tity of the species. The specimen was found near London, on the 19th of September, 

 1857, and is now in the cabinet of the Entomological Club. — Id. 



Note on certain nearly-allied Dromii. — As it seems possible that more than a single 

 species of Dromius may have been confounded, in British cabinets, under the name of 

 "agilis," perhaps the following memorandum, which I made a few months ago whilst 

 examining continental (typical) specimens of D. agilis, fenestratus and testaceus, may 



