or) [Jauuary, 



Note on Sivarms of Chhropisca circumdata Mg. {=ornata Loeiv, nee Mg.). — 

 From September 25th to October 10th in the present year (1921) large numbers 

 of this small Chloropid congregated on the ceiling of one of the laboratories 

 in the Kothainsted Experimental Station, and I may add that my identifica- 

 tion of the species in question has been confirmed by Mr. J. E. Collin. The 

 insects entered through the open windows during the mild sunny weather 

 which prevailed during that time. Swarms of Chloropids have several times 

 been recorded in entomological literature, vide, for example, H. Scott (Eut. Mo. 

 Mag. 1918, pp. 18, 43j, and are also mentioned by Sharp (Insects, pt. ii) : 

 in all cases they are probably referable to the above species. They appear to 

 have been more frequently recorded from the vicinity of Cambridge than else- 

 where, and sometimes swarms have been observed in the same room during 

 several successive years. Tlie significance of the swarming habit is uncertain, 

 but very possibly it is connected with hibernation, and it is noteworthy that 

 C. circumdata, already in winter-quarters, can be beaten out from the thatch 

 covering hay and other ricks during the autumn. 1 have no knowledge as to 

 the life-history of this spei ies : efforts to induce it to lay on grasses and young- 

 barley proved unsuccessful. Although the Chloropidae are among the most 

 essentially pliytophagous of all families of Diptera, an allied species, Chhropisca 

 glabra, has been shown by Parker in America {vide Journ. Econ. Entom 11) 

 to be predaceous in its larval stage upon Aphides. — A. D. Imms, D.Sc, 

 Eothamsted Experimental Station, Harpenden, Herts.: November 'iWi , 1921. 



(ibiluar]). 



Albert Brydges Fani was born on March 9th, 1841; and so was in his 

 eighty-first year when he died on October 81st, 1921. Of the surroundings of 

 his ciiildhood I know nothing : but he records that (about 1854) he used to take 

 T. lo-ulbum near Braintree Silk Mill. I doubt whether he kept any diary in 

 those early years. I first met him about midnight on July 7th, 1871, in the 

 New Forest. Our lights brought about a meeting- and a walk home to Lynd- 

 hurst together. In July 1873 he invited me to be his guest (with two other 

 friends) at Horning, where he had taken a cottage {sensu stricto \) . I spent 

 there one of tlie happiest ujonths I can remember. His wife, who died many 

 years ago, was a most kindly and indefatigable hostess : perhaps we hardly 

 realized at the time what it cost her to look after the comfort of four hungry 

 and erratic entomologists. 



By the following year Farn was established as Assistant Inspector of 

 Vaccine Ljnuph in the new Local Government Board. He had already done 

 the same work in the Public Health Department of the Privy Council Office. 

 From 1874 to 1892 (except for a few months at the end of 1882) he lived at 

 Dartford, working the famous fence on Dartford Heath, Harenth Wood, and 

 other good localities in the neighbouriiood. (But in 1879 " Darenth Wood is 

 alfliost closed : Row Hill Wood is being cut up for building. The fence has 

 been freshly tarred !") His son Edward was at this time (1879) beginning to 

 help him : and Farn was ;u'ranging to send him to Cambridge. But it was 

 not to be : in .lauuary 1883 the boy died. '' My only hope," Farn wrote, 



