392 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



It is, for a Chrysomelian, a decidedly large insect, stout and of 

 striking appearance, light-brown in colour, with a black sutural 

 stripe, which is slightly thickened from about midway down the 

 elytra to near the apex. I have never since seen it on asparagus, 

 but more than once I have taken it feeding in large numbers on 

 willow-shrubs about the right of way, a few miles north of our 

 present halting-place on the Peterborough railway. Last year T 

 discovered it very abundant, almost a pest, on wild grape-vines 

 near Sackville's Swamp, on the South Shore of Rice Lake, between 

 Bewdley and Gore's Landing. 



We now return to the little brook where our first Uonacias 

 were captured. Just over the fence, on our right hand, is a small 

 pine wood, out of which, indeed, it is that our little brook 

 emerges. This wood is a great place for early morels; it has also 

 yielded some very interesting species of Longicorn and Clerid on 

 the occasional windfall of white pine. Towards the north-east side 

 of it, where our way lies, grows a patch of raspberry canes, where 

 I captured once in full flight, with my hand, that most elusive of 

 dodgers, the Oberea. On the leaves of the raspberry once I saw 

 some tiny dark conical galls, as I supposed, and one of these I 

 tried to tear from the leaf; to my surprise, when I had partly 

 wrenched it aside, it distinctly moved and glued itself back on the 

 leaf. This was something new for a gall, and I pulled it away 

 from its fastenings to find that it contained a live larva, whose. legs 

 were kicking frantically to get back to the leaf. You have often 

 seen a refractory man-child plucked suddenly up by the nurse 

 from the place where it was playing? Well, that's how this cater- 

 pillar kicked. It was Chlamys, one of two genera that represent 

 the Vth tribe. These insects construct a case out of their own 

 excretions, and under cover of this tiny, steeple-crowned brownie's 

 cap of a case they move about and feed securely ; when the time 

 comes to pupate, they simply close the door at which the}' have 

 grazed and behold a ready-made cocoon. The insect itself is dark 

 brownish black, and covered with little warty excrescences; when 

 alarmed it closes its legs and falls to the ground, where it escapes 

 notice entirely or is passed over by warblers and other insectivor- 

 ous birds as a pebble or a pellet of dirt; one more instance of 

 protective mimicry preserved in this creature through all stages 

 of its existence. (To be continued.) 



