Hind-winga. Ground colour ashy-wMte. The only normal markings are 
those at the extreme base and the two blotches at the junction of the nervnres. 
The spaces between the nervures are more or less suffused with brownish scales. 
The ocelli are distinctly outlined, and several are only indicated. Body ashy-white. 
The specimen is in good condition, and as only very few specimens have made 
their appearance on our sand-hills this year, I may congratulate myself that the 
only one which I took should prove so remarkable. — E. L. Kagonot, 130, Conway- 
street, Birkenhead. 
A railway train stopped hy caterpillars ! — We think the following extract from 
the Melbourne "Argus" (Australian paper), of October 13th, 1868, jworthy of 
being reprinted here : — " One day last week, the hairy caterpillars that are so 
destructive to barley at a late period of the year were crossing the Sandhurst 
railway in such numbers, a few miles from town, that they stopped a train, not by 
the magnitude of the obstruction, but by renderiag it impossible for the engine to 
grip the rails, as the caterpillars were crushed beneath the wheels." We have no 
means of ascertaining the name of this larva, but it probably belongs to the Bomhyces. 
— Editoks. 
A Rejoinder to the Rev. T. A. Marshall's Reply on the gender of Acanthosoma. — 
I am much obhged to Mr. Marshall for his answers to some of my questions ; but 
if they prove anything, they prove too much, and they place me in this dilemma, 
that if J accept them as satisfactory, I cannot see that our old friend Earma is 
anything but an adjective, and if so, I cannot detect why it is neuter, as Mr. Marshall 
has told us it is. 
The contention is, that Acanthosoma cannot be, but that Karma is, neuter. 
Substitute Harma for Acanthosoma in the demonstration, ante, p. 209, and it stands 
thus : — 
" The subject of this word is a certain group of bugs. This subject is not 
contained in the word Earma, but is understood. Every noun that does no4 contain 
the subject, must contain the predicate, or it has no meaning at all.* And if it 
contains only the predicate, it is what grammarians call an adjective. Therefore 
Earma is an adjective. Q. E. D." 
I venture to think that, both here and at page 209, Q. E. D. must be read 
Quod est duhitandum. But if Earma be really an adjective, is it not as feminine as 
Acanthosoma ? 
The same line of argument would prove with equal conclusiveness that redbreast 
and wagtail are adjectives ; tliough I cannot quite make out whether Mr. Marshall 
considers them to be adjectives, or admits them to rank as substantives, but sub- 
stantives " not grammatical or logical," tainted with " incorrectness." 
As the word " illogical " did not alarm me on the former occasion, the word 
" ungrammatical " does not frighten me now. I care not to inquu-e whether it be 
true that redbreast and wagtail " belonged originally to the language of the vulgar 
* Mr. Marshall can scarcely say that Sarma has no meaning at all. He would never have pro- 
posed to reject Ilahn's significant Arma for the meaningless fiarma. I have been reminded that there 
is a genus Harma ot butterfliep ; which is another ground for retaining Amia. — J. W. D 
