1893-] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 



and some of them were quite shabby. In the Alpine Garden, 

 near the head of Tuckerman's Ravine, the golden-rod was in fine 

 bloom, and Plusia vaccinii was there in numbers; a few speci- 

 mens of Plnsia simplex came also to the flowers. Vanessa mil- 

 berti, perfect, fresh specimens, looking as if just emerged from 

 the chrysalis were flying here, and I took several. 



I had seen, when on the mountain in July, under stones near 

 the house, a large reddish mite. This was very common, and I 

 could have taken a hundred. But I knew nothing of the Acarinae 

 and had no correspondent interested in the family, but at this 

 later visit, having a little vial of alcohol with me, I preserved one 

 specimen; this Mr. Nathan Banks pronounces a new species. I 

 also collected, running on the rocks, a Phalangid (daddy long- 

 legs), which Mr. Banks writes me is new. Two spiders, Chibiona 

 canadensis and Pardosa brunnea, were very common among the 

 stones and moss; and Eristalis tenax, the ubiquitous drone-fly 

 of the lower country was buzzing about among the flowers. 



I found another larva of Chionobas semidea, the reddish form. 

 But a better discovery than this was that of a hairy larva, evi- 

 dently an Arctian, and unlike anything I have ever seen. Know- 

 ing how very few of this group are found on the mountain I 

 hoped that the larva might be that of the fine moth, Platarctia 

 parthenos, but Dr. Packard tells me it is not that, and he cannot 

 yet identify it. The larva of Laria rossii has been described, 

 and is quite unlike this. It was found crawling on a rock in the 

 Alpine Garden. .Not knowing its food-plant I gathered leaves 

 from all the plants and small shrubs near by and gave the cater- 

 pillar its choice. It at once selected the mountain bilberry, Vac- 

 cinium uliginosum, and ate greedily; after bringing it home I 

 tried other species of Vaccinium, but it would eat none of them. 

 Then I tried other plants, plantain, dandelion, lettuce, cabbage, 

 but with no success. Later it ate sparingly of poplar and white 

 birch. I have handed over this interesting larva to Dr. Packard, 

 who will describe and have drawings made of it, and then try to 

 carry it through its transformations, so I will not speak of it in 

 detail here. This is no place for a meteorological article, so will 

 not dwell upon the terrible storm of August 24th. It has ahx-ady 

 become a matter of history. Those of us who watched through 

 the hours of that long night of wild tumult and tempest will not 

 soon forget the experience. There was no collecting that day. 



