128 [June- 



joints are the same. The seventeen joints of tlie flagellum of the antenna are all 

 clear and distinct. In the inconspicuella group (or species) the first three joints 

 are not unfrequently, to all appearance, beginning to coalesce. In some specimens 

 there are apparently no joints, but only depressions where the joints should be, and 

 similarly the two penultimate joints seem to be uniting. The total length is not 

 diminished, the articulation seems to be present, but anchylosed. Though the 

 specimens are preserved ones, I think that these observations are correct, as similar 

 appearances are not present in the other articulations. A case and pupa-case, 

 apparently identical with those, has been sent me by Dr. Freer, from Rugeley." 



In general appearance, these females differ from all the preceding, since in them 

 the head, plate, and abdominal triangular shield are shiny black or brown-black, and 

 the whole surface darker ; in most of them the ovipositor also is black, and more or 

 less protruded, but not to the length of those of inconspicuella ; the broad patch of 

 white satiny scales is absent, but there is in some of them a narrow band of similar 

 scales round the anal extremity. The cases are coal-black. I do not think that 

 Mr. Haniin, either, will be satisfied without a further attempt to discover the male of 

 this species. Probably the most likely method would be to look for them on the 

 wing, but to reach a place several miles from home in time for such early risers as 

 these is not always easy. Lord Walsingham tells me that, when recently in Corsica, 

 the only time at which the species occurring there were to be found on the wing was 

 at, and soon after, sunrise. So soon as the sun began to get hot they disappeared. 

 Here the sun is not hot so early, and it will be remembered that Messrs. Bradley 

 and Martineau took S. Wockii at 8 and 9 o'clock a.m. 



My record during 1896 is of very little but failure, and I only note the 

 results as a basis for future work, and a record of what has been attempted. That 

 there is much jet to be accomplished is only too plain. Eeferring back again to the 

 late Mr. Edleston's remarks in our old Intelligencer, I observe that he says : "These 

 Solenobice arc a very difficult group ; it is impossible to know much about them 

 without a deal of attention to their habits. Those from the cases found on granite 

 rocks in North Wales may some time or other be bred. Another species occurs in 

 extraordinary numbers on an old limestone wall between Conway and Llandudno ; 

 it is like none that I know of ; I bred an apterous female out of a lot of three cases 

 which I thought were not going to produce anything, and it was of a yellowish 

 colour, and exceedingly active on its legs. Again, on some fir trees in the centre of 

 a large wood at Rudheath, Chesiiire, I met with some twenty cases from which I 

 bred a single female. Then there are cases on beech trees, which I find at Dunham 

 Park ; for years these only produced females ; these larvje take two years to arrive 

 at perfection." Adding to these the form which used to be found (and possibly 

 exists still) in profusion on field fences near Brandon, and which produced females 

 in plenty, but no males, we have a fair indication of work yet to be done in clearing 

 up the question as to whether all these apterous females belong to one species (which 

 hitherto we have, from faith rather than knowledge, called lichenella), or whether, 

 as now seems probable, there is a series of such species. 



I nmst not omit to notice one gleam of light in all this obscurity. In the 

 collection of the late Mr. H. Doubleday, at Bethnal Green, there are, under the head 

 of triquetrella, two male specimens, as well as females and eases. Unfortunately, 

 as in the rest of the collection, these are not labelled, nor is there any indication in 

 a catalogue, or elsewhere, of their origin. 



