144 
REPORTS OF SOCIETIES. 
and set for the cabinet, in illustration of his series of papers on “The 
Birds of the District,” recently read before the Society. They 
included, among the less common birds, specimens of the golden- 
crested wren, Regulus cristatus ; great titmouse, Pants major ; King¬ 
fisher, Alcedo ispida ; and great crested grebe, Podiceps cristatus. A 
hearty vote of thanks was accorded to Mr. Betteridge for his kind gift 
and his zealous labours in popularising ornithology. Mr. Betteridge 
replied, and intimated that the second instalment, including many of 
our summer visitors, would be ready in the early part of July. 
LEICESTER LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY. 
—Section D, Zoology and Botany. Chairman, F. T. Mott, F.R.G.S.— 
Monthly meeting, April 15th, attendance nine (two ladies). Exhibits: 
Pellia epipliylla , in fruit, one of the larger liepaticae, by Mr. Quilter. 
Cells of the common wall bee, Osmia mi fa , taken from an old mud 
wall, containing pupae in two stages, some in which the larvae were 
only just enclosed, others in which the perfect insect was ready to 
emerge, and from one of which, on being broken, the live bee escaped and 
crept about, its wings being not yet dry enough for flight; also several 
Coleopterous and Dipterous larvae found in a ball of bee-bread in 
another cell, and a number of mites from an empty cell, where they 
appeared to be feeding on the propolis with which it was lined, by Mr. 
W. A. Vice. Several numbers of the periodical Cole’s “Micro¬ 
scopical Science,” containing finely executed coloured figures of 
microscopic objects, accompanied by slides, by Mr. W. E. Grundy ; 
Dumortier’s “ Hepaticae Europae,” with coloured plates, price 10s. ; 
and Watson’s “ Topographical Botany,” price 16s. ; also a square of 
compressed camphor, very suitable for use in cabinets and herbaria, 
by the chairman. Paper “ On the Ricciacece ,” by the chairman, illus¬ 
trated by specimens, and a coloured drawing of Riccia glauca, recently 
collected from a shady bed in his garden at Birstal Hill. This species 
had not hitherto been recorded in Leicestershire, although it was 
perhaps the one referred to in Coleman’s list under the name of R. 
crystallina. The fruit of these abnormal Hepaticae was particularly 
curious and interesting, each of the hard black spores being shaped 
like the fourth part of a sphere, rounded on one side and pyramidal 
on the other. 
THE CARADOC FIELD CLUB.—The annual meeting of this 
Club was held at Shrewsbury, March 19tli, the Rev. J. D. La Touche, 
president, in the chair. After re-electing the officers and transacting 
the other ordinary business of the club, the following programme for 
the coming season was fixed upon :—Tuesday, May 19th, Titterstone 
Clee Hill; Wednesday, June 17tli, Bishop’s Castle, for the Bishop’s 
Moat and Offa’s Dyke; Tuesday to Thursday, September 28-30, to 
Cader Idris, North Wales ; Friday, October 9th (subject to alteration), 
Pontesford Hill and Abberley Valley. This last meeting has for its 
special object the study of cryptogamic botany. The Club has made 
it a practice for some years past to offer prizes to the children in the 
National Schools in the county, up to fourteen years of age, for the 
best collections of fossils, wild flowers, and insects. Three com¬ 
petitors appeared with collections of fossils, each of which was con¬ 
sidered worthy of a prize. These collections were purchased by the 
Club and presented to the Shrewsbury Free Museum. The completion 
and publication of “A Handbook to the Geology of Shropshire,” by 
the President, to the cost of which a grant had been made from the 
funds of the Club, was a subject of warm congratulation, especially as 
the sale of the work had already been so large as to secure its financial 
success. 
