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REPORT ON ZOOLOGY, MDCCCXLIII.
he found the Nomad® already hatched in the nests of the THucera. This isthe commencement of more precise observations on the relations of Para sites .
Dumas and Milne Edwards (Anns, de So. Nat. xx, p. 174) have institutedresearches on the preparation of wax by Bees, which contradict those ofHuber and Gundelach, inasmuch as that those observers imagined that theyhad proved by their experiments that the wax was merely separated fromthe vegetable nutriment in the body of the Bees, whilst on the contrary, theabove-named naturalists, by accurate and cautious experiments, have shownthat the wax is an animal secretion, for which the adipose substance affordsthe material.
The relative proportion of the sexes in the Meliponse has been elucidatedby Klug. (Bericht, ii. d. Verhandl. de Acad, de Wiss. z. Berlin, 1843, p.219.) With regard to this subject he expresses himself decidedly, thatthere is only a single female in each swarm, which differs in size, length ofabdomen, &c. from the males and workers, and would without doubt, havebeen sent in greater numbers by the intelligent travellers, v. Offers andSellow, had they met with more of them in the nests. Among a great num-ber, however, of workers and numerous males, single females of only threespecies have been collected by these travellers, viz. of the Manduri Bees(M. liturata , new species), the Wora Bee (M. davipes, Centr. davipes, E.),and of the Jetaki Bee ( M. angustula , Latr.)
STREPSIPTERA.
Siebold’s important work on the Strepsiptera (in theseArchiv . i, Bd. p. 137, t. 7) has been already noticed in thelast year’s Report.
A new and important undertaking on the subject of theEuropean Lepidoptera is Herrich Schaffer ’s ‘ SystematischeBearbeitung der Schmetterlinge von Europa,’ or Systematicarrangement of the Lepidoptera of Europe , as text, revision,and supplement to J. Hiibner’s collection of EuropeanLepidoptera, with plates by Geyer. The plates containspecies and varieties not as yet figured in Hiibner’s work ;