64 Entomological Society. 



by them, and which was about two feet from the upper level, imme- 

 diately below a large dropping of cowdung. The stone was on the 

 slope of the bank, the cavity containing four balls, two nearly 

 finished and two about half- size. The male and female were hard 

 at work, and after a little surprise at the light, continued the opera- 

 tion of adding earth to the smallest ball; this was performed by 

 rolling it round and round, scraping up the mud which gathered, 

 and by pattering it firmly with the fore and hind tibiae. When I 

 use the word pattering, I only mean to say the insects kept their 

 legs in constant motion on the ball, as obtains in Sisyphus when 

 rolling its pill ; but in order that it should collect more earth, the 

 male was frequently employed in digging beneath it. I could not 

 detect the female in the act of depositing her ova. One side of 

 every ball is very thin (comparatively), which leads me to believe 

 that on this side the ova is placed. In forming the nucleus of cow- 

 dung, the female is the principal worker ; she rolls it round and 

 round, digging occasionally, so as to let it sink as the earth is thrown 

 up above, and in this work the male also assists. — The small insect 

 allied to Aphodius (^Chcetopisthes fulvus, Westw.) is one of our com- 

 monest, though not indigenous to these hills at this height: it 

 abounds in horse- and cow-dung. — A small species of Tridactylus is 

 also very common ; during the rains, with a sheet and a lantern, my- 

 riads may be taken. Was it perfect or in the larva state } or rather 

 I should ask if the wing-cases were black ? — The larva of Hete- 

 rorhina Roylii to my knowledge may become a pupa, and perfect from 

 the pupa in less than two months, however long it may have been 

 in the larva state. — I arrived here on the 1st of June, and collected 

 a great number of larvae of all sizes, which I brought home, accom- 

 panied with the rotting debris of oak-dust in which I found them. 

 Of these, six formed cocoons of the earth and oak-dust, and two 

 were perfect the day before yesterday, and two more came out yes- 

 terday, but were not H. Roylii, though certainly I could in nowise 

 distinguish a difference in any of the larvse. One was a bronzed 

 Cetonia (Heterorhina ?) with faint white lines on the elytra and 

 thorax; the other a bronzed green with spots. — Does the Atlas 

 moth feed on oak-trees in its larva state, or on the hill species of 

 Berberis } At Almorah I took the cocoon from the latter, but never 

 saw the larva ; here I have taken the insect in the latter stage (at 

 least I conjecture it will turn out to be the moth in question) on the 

 oak, and the cocoon looks very like what I took at the former place. 

 The larva of the one now alluded to is very like the one which 

 forms the Tussa silk (I believe an Actias also), but the nidus is like 

 whitey-brown paper and no thicker, in this respect resembling that 

 formed by Actias Luna, but the caterpillar is not the same. — I heard 

 a few days ago from a friend (W. Benson, Esq.), that a novel spe- 

 cies of Trictenotoma had been captured in his neighbourhood (Mus- 

 soorie), as also either a variety of, or novelty allied to, Geotr. 

 longimanus. The former he describes to me as more nearly allied 

 to the Prionides than to the Cerambyces, though possessing con- 

 jiexion with the Lucani as far as the antennas are concerned. The 



