NEMOBIUS SYLVESTEIS. 133 



sheltering there, or have come to feed on the many 

 living creatures that such a fungus usually contains. 

 As the result of observations on specimens in captivity 

 they would seem to be rather general feeders. On 

 2 August 1915 I captured some females in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Lady Cross in the New Forest. These were 

 kept alive at home and supplied with food of various 

 kinds. Leaves of Pyrus torminalis Ehrh. (service 

 tree) happened to be given them ; on these they fed. 

 Banana was also accepted. Bread was readily eaten 

 on 12 August, and the next day they fed freely on raw 

 beef. Later in the day (loth) I noticed a quantity of 

 cork fragments in the large tube in which they were 

 confined, bitten off, I presume, in an attempt to make 

 a way out of the prison. They would not take to a 

 nasturtium leaf. One escaped on August the 14th. 

 The next day the remaining two were offered a piece 

 of cheese, but they did not appear to eat it readily. 

 A rose leaf was but little attacked, although Pyrus 

 torminalis (of the same Natural Order) had seemed 

 quite acceptable. When in captivit} 7 apparently bread 

 is a suitable food ; but it is possible that in nature 

 these crickets are omnivorous, like their relatives of 

 the kitchen. Like them also the wood-crickets are 

 very "musical' in summer days in the New Forest. 

 On August nights, too, when scarcely a living thing- 

 betrays its presence by sound, a quiet chirping is 

 occasionally heard, which I presume is clue to these 

 little crickets. 



DISTRIBUTION.- -N. sylvestris is found in woods 

 throughout Central Europe (Burr). Though of limited 

 distribution in Britain, it occurs across the sea in 

 Holland, Belgium, and France. Apparently it is less 

 general in the south, but has been taken in Spain, as well 

 as in Algeria on the other side of the Mediterranean. 



o 



BRITISH LOCALITIES. 



Curtis tells us that this cricket was first discovered as 

 British by J. C. Dale who found it "amongst dead leaves 



