6188 



Entomological Society. 



Meeting, asserting in the report of the Meeting published in ' The Eutomologisl's 

 Weekly Intelligencer,' p. 95, that they went fully the length of maintaining the 

 development theory,— that is, the theory advocated by the Lamarckian and * Vestiges 

 of Creation ' schools, that an animal in a series of ages is able to develope itself into a 

 totally different kind of creature; that a mouse, for instance, anxious to fly, is able 

 after a long series of generations to acquire wings like a bat. Mr. Westwood, on the 

 contiary, affirmed the identity and permanence of species, but insisted not only on the 

 possibility of the modification of individuals composing the species, but also on the 

 permanence of such modifications of specific forms through several or even many 

 generations, so long, in fact, as the disturbing influences which produced the modifi- 

 cation remained at work. It was by this kind of radiation from a central specific type 

 that geographical varieties were produced and perpetuated; and thus, for instance, 

 Mr. Westwood was induced to regard all the species of Ornithoptera allied to O. Pria- 

 mus, recently proposed by himself and others, as modified sub-species or local varieties 

 of that insect. So also were produced by the agency of man himself the diflerent 

 vaneties of the silk-worm, so well known in the magnaneries of the South 

 of France and Italy. He believed that if many of the Micro-Lepidoptera regarded by 

 Mr. Stainton as distinct species were really such, they would exhibit tangible struc- 

 tural modifications in the length and form of the joints of the palpi, the number of 

 joints in the antenna?, the structure of the veins of the wings, or of the tarsi. Mr. 

 Stainton had, however, failed in describing any such characteristic modifications. 



Mr. Stainton observed that he should consider that such differences as Mr. West- 

 wood alluded to would be generic, not specific. 



Dr. Gray maintained the existence of permanent and geographical varieties in all 

 classes of animals, from Mammalia dowawards. 



Mr. Stevens exhibited a few insects collected in Madagascar by Madame Pfeiffer, 

 amongst which was a line species of Calandra. 



Mr. Mitford exhibited a beautiful Noctua (Brana calopasa) from Ceylon, and gave 

 the iuUowing interesting account of the habits of the species, communicated by E. L. 

 Mitford, Esq. : — " One morning in March, about seven o'clock, I saw a cloud of these 

 i]ioths whirling and sporting round the trunk of a large tree. After continuing their 

 gyrations for half an hour, they gradually settled in a large patch on the shady side of 

 liie tree, forming a sort of thatch, the wings of one row overlapping the bodies of the 

 next, when they appeared like an excrescence on the bark, which they resembled ia 

 colour : this habit is very peculiar to this moth, as it is very uncommon for moths to 

 go in swarms.*' 



Cells of the Honey Bee, 



Mr. Tegetmeier stated that he had recently made some experiments with a view of 

 ascertaining whether the cells of the hive-bee were formed hexagonally, or whether 

 such form was the result of lateral pressure, or rather the natural result of placing 

 cells close together without any loss of space; with this object in view he had placed 

 pieces of wax on the bars of one of " Wildman's'' hives and watched the bees com- 

 mence excavating therein ; the cells formed, invariably proved cylindrical. They 

 were, however, not in juxtaposition, as in the normal comb. 



Mr. Tegetmeier also expressed his conviction that the cells of bees were also 

 formed in the first instance with a hemispherical base, having observed the deposition 



