give a complete list of insects. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity of inspecting a couple of beetles, which were caught on the estate of a respected friend of mine, the Hon. A.D. van der Yon Netscher, formerly a landed proprietor in Demerara, and member of the Council there. They were trapped by one of his coolies while in the act of burrowing in the ground for the evident purpose of finding their way through a hole in the rhizome up to the top of the tree, in order, by the attacks of their larvæ, to destroy it; the whole according to the manner described by Mr. Russell, whose very interesting account is fully corroborated by Mr. Netscher's, who has very obligingly drawn it up from his own experience, at my request. The beetles are a male and female, well known in the country as belonging to the real destroyers of cocoa-nut trees, and from their very prominent features, easily recognizable as answering in every point—the male to the description of the Scarabæus aloë, the other, or female, to that of the S. alveus in Dr. Voet's 'Catalogus Systematicus Coleopterorum,' both insects being stated to belong to Surinam. Let me add that, from their hirsute aspect, they look a by no means very amiable couple."
The Secretary exhibited a Longicorn beetle which had been sent from Birkenhead by Mr. David Henderson. It had been captured on the wing in that town, having probably flown from a ship in the river.
Mr. J.W. Slater read a paper entitled "Vivarium Notes on some common Coleoptera."—R Meldola, Hon. Sec.
NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.
The question of zoological classification would furnish study for a life-time, and the more we look into it the further we seem from a satisfactory solution. Nor is the difficulty much lessened by restricting ourselves to a particular class, Aves, and limiting our enquiry still further by dealing only with British birds. The subject of "affinities" is so intricate, and "nomenclature" has become so involved and perplexing, that he is a bold man who attempts to arrange the one and revise the other. And yet if no "system" has hitherto been proposed which has met with universal approbation on the part of ornithologists, it has not been for want of suggestions. We have before us half-a-dozen modern
