282 [November. 



110 lack of vegetation, and even some good-aized trees. The 30tli at 

 Baudin again, where I got the afternoon ashore, but, the tide being 

 low, I went in for collecting sea shells on the beach, or rather reef, 

 and got a fair varietj^ August 1st, I landed at 10 a.m. with a survey 

 party on " Jones' Island," and spent the day there very pleasantly. 

 This is little more than a sand bank, about 1| mile in circumfer- 

 ence at high water, but surrounded by a very extensive reef, which 

 dries out at low tide for more than a mile all round ; the Island itself 

 is covered with coarse grass and herbage, and in the centre is a large 

 deposit of an inferior kind of guano, which had been worked at some 

 previous period, as there were eight or ten large iron water tanks left 

 there, besides numbers of broken shovels, &c., and some large heaps 

 of the guano piled up ready to be carried away. The number of sea 

 birds on the Island was astonishing, but unfortunately none were 

 breeding at the time ; I picked up a few CoJeoptera (Ilarpalus, Opa- 

 trum, Gorynetes, &c.) and Hymenoptera, not to mention a couple of 

 human crania, apparently those of aboriginals, but very old — they had 

 been there quite 20 years I should say ; however, I thought them worth 

 bringing off. No land shells, but a varied assortment of sea shells on 

 the reef at low water ; it was 10 p.m. before we were able to leave 

 the Island, on account of the tide, and the ship having moved out 

 some eight miles, it was nearly 2 a.m. before we got on board again. 



We left for Port Darwin on the following afternoon, and arrived 

 there at 8 a.m. on the 6th. In the course of one or two walks on 

 shore I saw exceedingly few insects on the move, only stray specimens 

 of J^iirycus and Delias Ayanippe, which latter I failed to catch ; but 

 I fell in with a few nice forms of Coleoptera for the first time at this 

 place, chiefly under stones and logs in very dry places. Perhaps the 

 most interesting was a Brenthid, almost a fac simile of Amorphoce- 

 phalus, of which I found six examples under a piece of ironstone, in 

 a nest of medium-sized red ants. Another "ant's nester," a little 

 yellow species near Cohiocera, but larger and more oval, occurred in 

 large numbers wdth a very small black ant. One or two fine Cnrahidce 

 (notably a thing like a large Pcecilus lepidus, in plenty) were found 

 under the stones, and a very nice Heteromeron (? Toxicum s]i.), with 

 two long horns on head in (^ , occurred under a log (I afterwards got 

 a good many more up country). A Sispa, exceedingly like H. atra 

 in all respects, a nice Langurid, and one or two very queer forms of 

 Memipitera were obtained by sweeping ; while a moderate-sized and 

 deeply punctured black Heteromeron, probably a near ally of Panda- 

 rtcs, occurred under logs somewhat freely, along with one or two 

 Elateridce, &c. 



