14 
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 
As most of yon already know, our vice-President Mr. Burrows had 
arranged to provide the annual address, in the shape of an account of 
his recent researches concerning the Genitalia of many of our British 
Lepidoptera. This was to have been undertaken jointly with Mr. 
Peirce, of Liverpool, who was going to produce the various specimens 
by lantern slides. This, unfortunately, has had to be abandoned, at 
any rate for a time, owing to the serious illness of our friend Mr. 
Burrows, who, I am sure, has the sympathy of the whole Society. 
Nevertheless it has placed us in a somewhat awkward position as it 
has been impossible to obtain a substitute, and at such short notice it 
has been quite impossible for me to prepare anything worthy of the 
name of an address even if I had already possessed the necessary 
material. 
Therefore I only propose to give a short sketch of the season’s 
collecting and to mark some of the peculiarities noticed in the time of 
appearance of some of our most common species. And afterwards, 
with your permission, I propose reading a few notes by Dr. Sequeira 
on “ Reminiscences of Wicken.”* 
I think it will be conceded by most of us tbat we have arrived at 
the conclusion of another very poor season. 
I know that some of our members have been exceptionally fortunate 
in one or two directions. For instance, Tapinostola concolor has been 
taken in some abundance, and I hope and expect to see the full life- 
history published before very long. Until recent years this was one of 
the most difficult species to obtain, although its habitat was known, 
and it was never parted with unless in exchange for some one or other 
of our greatest rarities. In the year 1891 I took a solitary insect at 
Felixstowe, which Mr. Tutt then considered to be T. concolor, and he 
remarked in the Entomologist's Record that we might now expect to see 
concolor more generally represented in our cabinets. But the privilege 
of distributing this insect never fell to my lot, as I never saw another 
in the same locality, and I am now indebted to our friend Mr. Tautz 
for possessing true concolor. I always had grave doubts as to the 
identity of my Felixstowe specimen, and the recent addition to my 
series rather increases those doubts than otherwise. 
One of the chief features of the season has been the very late 
appearance of many insects. To begin with, one of our early species, 
Nyssia hispid aria , was bred this year in the open, on April 10th, by 
Mr. Willsdon. This appears to be very late, as the earliest date I have 
bred it was January 14th, 1882, and the earliest date taken wild was 
February 7th, 1888, in Richmond Park. Spilosoma lubricipeda was 
extremely late, occurring on July 16th, 17th, 19th, and August 5th, 
all just emerged, these, as far as my collecting goes, are record dates, 
the nearest approach being July 15th, 1898, all at Forest Gate. I know 
that this species in confinement is sometimes double brooded, but this 
year they did not commence to appear until late, and they kept on 
* Printed at encl of this volume. 
XX. 
