210 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 
lake without once witnessing the phenomenon I speak about. If, how- 
ever, luck is favorable, the number of species and specimens of all orders 
that can thus be found is simply incredible to any one who has not been 
on the spot himself. It suffices to say here that in 1877 Mr. H. G. Hub- 
bard and myself collected, or rather picked up, within four days, upwards 
of 1,100 species of Coleoptera alone, and this not under quite favorable 
conditions. 
This is of course an excellent opportunity of filling the collecting-boxes 
with large series of the choicest and rarest species ; but this mode of col- 
lecting is a most unsatisfactory one, for nothing can be learned regarding 
the food-habits or mode of life, or earlier stages, of all the thousands of 
species-found on the beach. In fact, it is most aggravating to the ento- 
mologist to see on the beach hundreds of specimens of a showy species of 
which he is entirely unable to find a single specimen in the woods or 
wherever the species may be supposed to live. 
When during the past year I had again the opportunity of spending a 
few days in July on the south shore of Lake Superior, and of witnessing 
the washing ashore of multitudes of insects, I had the idea that this vast 
mass of material could possibly be utilized to point out, within a reason- 
able degree of certainty or probability, the power exhibited by the various 
species of insects of retaining their vitality when immersed in cold water. 
I went to work accordingly and began to note down those species or 
genera which appeared to me to have reached the shore in good /. <?., liv- 
ing-condition, in contradistinction to those which I found drowned, at 
least as far as the greatest majority of specimens would justify such state- 
ment; but very soon I found out that the immense material before me 
was too much for my task, and I had to confine myself to the commonest 
species, which aggregate more than 800 species, distributed most un- 
evenly among the various orders. 
At the first glance it would appear that such comparison based upon 
this material was impossible, for we have no means to ascertain how long 
these insects have been immersed in the water. But the following consid- 
erations induced me to continue my notes and to complete them after my 
return to Detroit from the collections made in former years at the same 
locality. 
Among the thousands of specimens of a common .species found on the 
beach a certain proportion must have been exposed to the water fora short 
time, another number for a longer period, and still another portion for a 
very long period. If all these specimens, or by far the greatest portion of 
them, reach the shore in living condition, it is evident that we can enu- 
merate this species among those that can endure, without injury and for 
a long time, exposure in cold water; and if, on the other hand, all or most 
specimens of another common species are found drowned on the beach, 
we may correctly infer that even those specimens which have been in the 
water for a short period were killed by the immersion, and that we can 
enumerate this species among those which cannot bear a long exposure in 
