262 THE entomologist's record. 



roadside, and to my delight found a fine maciolabious male of i-Vir/zr/^/rt 

 toiiiis, Kol. It was the first time that I bad seen this fine Russian 

 earwig- alive ; it was on July 11th, and on the 24th and exactly a week 

 later on my way back, I took the female under the same brick. 



In Tiflis, a week's steady rain and mundane occupations rendered 

 collecting impossible ; the only entomological occupations were long- 

 conversations with Philip Adamovich Zaitseff, Evgeny Georgevich 

 Konig, and Boris Petrovich Uvaroff. 



Nor was I any luckier in the interesting old town of Kutais, the 

 capital of Imeretia, reputed to have been the home of Aeetes and Medea. 

 Two separate visits to the hilly region of Guria, the interesting district 

 behind the Black Sea Coast from Batum to Poti were also disappointing 

 from an entomological point of view ; although I spent a number of 

 days in the hills and forests, sometimes camping out, either by sheer 

 ill-luck, or because it was too early in the season, or because the 

 weather was not generally favourable, I observed little and took less. 

 Guria is a hilly country of strongly folded Uligocene and Miocene 

 shales and sandstones, with basaltic and trachytic intrusions. The 

 climate is moist and warm ; the vine and maize flourish, and tea is 

 cultivated by a few enterprising landowners ; the hills are covered 

 with a tangled jungle of creepers and rhododendrons. I saw very 

 few butterflies ; Gonepteryx rJuiiiini, Pararge meciaera, I'ljraiiieis 

 atalanta were fairly common. In Orthoptera, I found 2\'f'niobius het/deni, 

 Fjsch., Gri/llus hurcU(jaleims, Latr., Tcttir hipunctatu.s, L., and Stauro- 

 dena bicolor, Charp., were pretty common everywhere. S-v\-eeping 

 casually at Samkhto I was lucky enough to pick up a fine macrolabious 

 male of Forficnla kaznah-ovi, Sem. ; which species I had hitherto only 

 known from descriptions ; it is closely related to the Balkan P'. aetolica, 

 replacing- it on the eastern shores of the Black Sea. In the thickets 

 on the Pliocene conglomerates and Maikopian sandstones and shales 

 of Ompareti, near the station of Supsa, I found an immature Oh/iitho- 

 srelis, Leiitop/ii/e.s laticauda, Friv., and a brilliant green Podisuia ; most 

 unfortunately I did not come across a male, and so dare not name it 

 with certainty ; probably it is F, hnniiji, described by me from 

 Bakuriani. The most interesting botanical observation was the 

 remarkably luscious flavour of a berry, resembling- a mulberry, but far 

 superior, that wastes its fragrance on the thicket air, being apparently 

 most underservedly neglected by the natives. 



At the stanUia of Meria near Notanebi, while waiting by the road- 

 side for a horse, I took with my fingers a pair of Parajilevvns ulUaceu», 

 Germ., which, I believe, has not hitherto been recorded from the 

 Caucasus. 



On July 7th I arrived at the scorching swampy station of Evlakh, 

 at 4 a.m., and was promptly attacked savagely by dense columns of 

 mosquitos, which plastered my hands as fast as I swept them oft'. 

 Malaria is the scourge of these marshy plains ; the natives build high 

 towers in their gardens to escape from the pest, and there sleep at an 

 altitude above their range of flight. It was a glorious drive over the 

 steppe in the cool morning air, with the snow-clad crest of Daghestan 

 in the distance. At six the " phaeton " reached Geok-Tapa, where 

 there was waiting a warm and cheery welcome from Alexander 

 Borisovich Shelkovnikov. 



I was allowed a week's holiday in this entomologist's paradise ; my 



