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beauty of their mazarine blue, sanguine green, and white tints, to the charms of 

 those solitary spots, where, seated on the heath beneath the birchen shade, the 

 tired Naturalist, while he rests his wearied frame, marks with pleasure the succes- 

 sive gleams of coloured light, as band after band of these bright creatures flutter 

 about the pink Polygoni or sober brown shaggy and wiggy Bulrushes. 



A. autumnalis (Lestes autumnalis, Leach) is a species that appears late in the 

 year, with light-brown thorax and abdomen, and membranaceous wings marked 

 with " an oblong-quadrate parallelopiped stigma." Unlike its congeners, its incon- 

 spicuous colours render it an object of no attraction, and, coming with the close of 

 summer amidst rains and falling leaves, its manners and habits have been little 

 attended to or regarded. There is still much to be learned respecting this inte- 

 resting tribe, both as regards their larva and perfect state ; and he who would 

 publish a monograph of the British Libellulidae in English, with accurate figures 

 of the whole, would be rendering a very acceptable service to entomological sci- 

 ence, since I can refer to no English publication at present, for a description of 

 all the species, though Mr. Stephens in his splendid work has much enlarged the 

 Agriones. 



But while we have been thus dilating upon the Libellulidce, the sun shining 

 forth with almost insufferable radiance, warns us that however congenial his heat 

 may be to them, it is too powerful for us, and the shade of yonder oak coppice 

 offers a grateful shelter. A spring over the brook, a crash upon the broad leaves 

 of the Tussillago, and we are within it. How deliriously cool ; while not a 

 sound breaks the stillness, and not even a vagrant fly molests us. Alone in 

 gloomy quietude Paris quadrifolia lurks, with her single sable berry surrounded 

 by the green calyx ; and springing up among the dead oak leaves the curious or- 

 chideous plant Listera nidus-avis, can at a little distance be scarcely distinguished 

 from them, though now opening her singular brown dead-like flowers. On, now 

 then, to inhale the thymy fragrance of the hill top, where the minute flesh-coloured 

 and delicate blossoms of the Ornithopus perpusillus couch lowly on the earth, 

 spreading out their curious legumes in imitation of the feet of birds, and where in 

 long trailing spikes the dark purple Milkwort (Polygala) spreads out her winged 

 petals, and the blue Argus butterfly wantons among the rising brakes, just unfold- 

 ing their curled-up fronds. But the Pheasant has just risen with a loud whir 

 from the eggs she was sitting upon, and an alarmed gamekeeper who will know 

 nothing of our " untaxed and undisputed game" is approaching. Perhaps on a 

 future occasion, blue skies and sunny hours may urge us to be " abroad " again, 

 gleaning delight amid the attractions of the woods and fields. 



