1903 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 81 



remnined there until I took them off, wliile others kept tiying around the lantern pole. This 

 was rather a drawback as it dazzled my eyes, trying to jump from one side to the other. Soon 

 matters becime very lively — Hawk-moths in all directions, and it kept me busy taking them 

 from the sheet. I counted at one time about a score of Sinemithus geminatus on the sheet 

 besides numbers that were buzzing about in the grass and darting around the lantern ; later on 

 in the evening there must have been fifty in sight at once. I was now kept busy all the time 

 till at last it was not safe to put any more in my bottles, so I went into the house and waited 

 for a while until I thought my captures were all dead. Then I emptied them into a small box 

 and went out after some more. To my surprise they were as thick as ever— some on the 

 sheet, others flying into the gra?3. then up again, around the pole, across to the shed, back 

 once more, striking the lantern, then down into the grass. It did nut take nie long to refill my 

 battles and I then stopped, well satisfied with my evening's work. If anyone had begun to 

 collect when I left off, he might easily have caught a hundred Sphinges, besides Noctuids and 

 Geometers without number. Now was the time that the chloroform was missed, for if I had 

 not forgotten it, I should have put in another hour, as it was such great fun and only 

 twelve o'clock. 



When I returned to the house, the first thing I did was to look at my captures and I was 

 surprised to find some of them moving, so I put them all into the bottles until the morning. 

 One great mistake was made in not capturing all the Smerintlms (jeminafits, for by not dring 

 so I lost a good many fine S. cerysii. Not knowing how to distinguish them, I thought them 

 all gemitbcitus, therefore I did not bother about them as Spldnx albescens was to me more 

 desirable. Cerysii must have escaped me very often, as I was not aware that it was taken in 

 Manitoba, and it came to me as a surprise when Mr. Frank of the American Entomological Co. 

 informed me that I had sent him cerysii under the name of geminatns. 



It is very strange that only five species of Hawk-moths turned up that tvening, viz., 

 .S. albescens, Paonias myops and exccecatus, S. qemiiiatas and cerysii, considering that I have 

 found twenty-five distinct species of the larvce. These I have fed and reared as far as the 

 pupa state, but then there came a full stop, for I can never get them any further. There is 

 something in my treatment that does not suit them and which 1 do not yet^ understand, for I 

 have good success with all other kinds that I rear. 



