88 
correspondence* 
Notice op the Discovery of a New Insect, Morrm®,— Dale*s MSS* 
To the Editor of the Naturalist. 
Sir,” I have great pleasure in forwarding for your pages a description of a 
species of Acosmetia., which I believe to he entirely new to entomologists. My 
kind friend, Mr. Dale, has been so good as to name it after me, as the discoverer 
of the insect. The following is the general description :—pale straw colour, ap¬ 
proaching to silvery white, the upper part of the wings very faintly streaked 
with narrow brown lines, diverging (from an obscure black dot?) towards the 
margin, which is of the same colour with the rest of the wings, from which they 
are hardly distinguishable | the wings underneath are divided transversely by a 
faint waved brown line, and the margins clouded with the same colour. The 
insect is an inch and half a line in width from tip to tip, and is not thick bodied, 
though belonging rather to that class than to the thin-bodied. The first speci¬ 
mens I took were met with several years ago, near Charmouth, Dorsetshire, be¬ 
yond a lime-kiln on the cliff on the east side of the little river Char. I believe 
individuals may be taken there every year, though they certainly are not com¬ 
mon. They rise up from the grass, and fly well and straight, on being disturbed 
in the day-time, somewhat after the manner of the Plusia gamma (when not 
flying voluntarily), and are rather difficult to capture. They seem to be among 
the long grass, to which they assimilate in colour. I do not remember the 
exact time of their appearance, but it is about the middle of summer, and they 
remain out ” a considerable time. Mr. Dale has also taken specimens at the 
same locality. Francis Orpen Morris. 
April 4, 1837. 
CHAPTER OF CRITICISM. 
To the Editor of the Naturalist 
SiR,-”'W’hen your readers hear that I am about to place before you a few hints 
on the conducting of a periodical, they may well marvel at my boldness in 
addressing them to the Commander-in-Chief of two excellent Journals—-the one 
quarterly, the other monthly—who must of course possess no small experience in 
such matters. Still, though I cannot boast of being at the helm of even a weekly 
magazine, yet a subaltern may often be enabled to throw out suggestions at 
least worthy the consideration of his officer; and with this view I propose to 
you, Mr. Editor, one or two alterations and additions which may perhaps tend to 
improve the character of the Naturalist. First, then, I would recommend the 
introduction of a chapter dedicated to what Loudon, in the better days of the 
