Cecidomyia trifolii, Canandian Entomologist, vol. xi., p. 44. 1879.

I am indebted to Dr. Hagen, of Cambridge, Mass., for the information that the name which I had selected for the clover-seed fly was preoccupied by Franz Loew, in Verhandl. Zool. Bot. Gesell., Wien, 1874, vol. xxiv., where he describes (p. 142) the male and female, larva, pupa and gall of a species occurring in a folded leaf of Trifolium pratense, and figures (pl. 2, f. 4) the deformation of the plant.

A. biviella Zell.

I have received both sexes of this species from Prof. Fernald, of Orono, Maine. It is a prettier species than A. bella Cham., with the fasciæ much more distinct. Zeller describes only the ♂.

I have in my note-books descriptions of one or more stages of several species, of which no part of the life-history has hitherto been published, and I propose, with the permission of the Editor, to give them in a series of three or four papers.

Many attempts have been made to devise something by means of which to capture the Noctuidae, but the results have been usually so meagre that the contrivances have been abandoned in disgust. I have been using a contrivance this season which will really abundantly repay one for the trifling trouble and expense involved in its construction.

The new edition of the Catalogue of the described Diptera of North America, by the Baron Osten Sacken, Washington, 1878, ranges doubtlessly among the most important works published on the North American Fauna. A very detailed and elaborate preface tells only in brief manner the immense amount of work done by the author since the publication of the first catalogue in 1858. A large part of new information is given at the end of the Catalogue in 335 notes.

Chlorion aerarium.

Length one inch. Bronzed-purple ; antennæ, mandibles, tegulæ and feet black, postscutellum blue; wings dark brown, with a purple reflection, Clypeus terminated by a row of five teeth, the lateral teeth a little more remote from the intermediate teeth than the intermediate teeth are from the median tooth.

Packard places the Hymenoptera at the head of the Class Insecta, on account of the completeness of their transformations and the perfection of their instincts. This is also the position assigned to this Order by Dana. Packard ranks the Bees (Apidæ) at the head of the Hymenoptera, thus placing them at the very summit of the insect creation.

The following circular in reference to the Hessian Fly has been issued from the office of the U. S. Entomological Commission. The subject is a most important one, and fearing it might not otherwise reach all our readers, we present it here.