132 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [May, 'O2 



Now that we have the clue I hope our American species will 

 be rapidly overhauled and their life histories fully known. I 

 will add that about the same time I found the chestnut 

 miners I found similar mines and larvae on oak ; these may 

 be the same species ; I did not take care of them and made no 

 notes, thinking it impossible they could be anything else than 

 Coleopterous. 



A word about the perfect insects of these group may be of inter- 

 est. My first specimen was taken just about at dusk April 21. 

 It doubtless was resting on or near the ground. I caught it as 

 it was flying upwards in an almost vertical line, flight quite 

 slow and seemingly laborious. The second specimen (and I 

 think a different species) was taken about 8.30 p. m. about the 

 middle of July on the wire mosquito screen enclosing my piazza, 

 attracted by a lamp which was within. The third specimen 

 was taken May 4, about 1 1 a. m. It is the same species as the 

 first and was disturbed from the ground or low down on a tree 

 trunk. As a violent wind was blowing it was impossible to 

 observe its natural flight and it was captured with difficulty. 



I saw a fourth specimen resting on the bole of a small beech 

 tree about five feet from the ground ; the morning sun, about 



I 1 a. m., was shining on it, and it sparkled like an emerald 

 from the light reflected from the exquisite metallic green of its 

 wings. I attempted to place a small cyanide bottle over it, 

 but before my hand was within a foot of it, it jumped like a leaf 

 hopper and was out of sight in an instant. Numbers one and 

 three were captured (and number four seen) in a rather open 

 w r oods, principally hard and soft woods and a great abundance 

 of shrubbery, on the Watchung Mountains, back of Montclair, 

 at an elevation of five or six hundred feet above sea level. 



Cocoons of Samia Cynthia. 



By HERMAN HORNIG. 



(See Plate VI.) 



Raising L,epidoptera from the egg to its final form as a 

 "thing of beauty" is a pleasant experience, when the cater- 

 pillars are about by the hundred, but not so interesting when 

 the leaves for food have to be carried from the suburbs of the 



