176 THE entomologist's record. 



very calm weather. In such weather, large swarms of the sycamore 

 Ajyhis hover about the tree which it frequents, and the rising of the 

 wind might sweep it away, and accumiilate it in swarms at a distance 

 from its native place. Last summer was very favourable to the 

 sycamore Ajy'/ns, and its swarms are reported to have been as extra- 

 ordinary as those of the Si/rjihi ; and if the former was the only food 

 of the latter, the usual numbers of them have been of no benefit to 

 the crops." Again, in 1S69, Home observes (loc. cit., iv., pp. 356-357) 

 that, at Margate, a great number of Syrphids — Syrphiis baltcafii^. S. 

 decorus, S. taeniatus — as well as Krutalh tenax, arrived on August 24th, 

 thewind then blowing from the east coast and thew^eather being very hot. 

 The pier at Eamsgate on the same day was almost covered with them, 

 and everyone said that they came from the channel. After that the wind 

 was from inland, and, by September 9th, they had become quite scarce. 

 The same observer notes that, some years previously, Mr. F. Smith 

 saw the line of surf on the beach for miles at Bournemouth covered 

 with the dead bodies of Si/ypJnis pijrastri, so that they might have been 

 taken up by shovels full, the insects having been drowned in the sea, 

 and their remains thus cast ashore. The Proceed ijujs of the Knt. Soc. 

 London for November 15th, 1869, contain the following observations: 

 " At Walton-on-the-Naze, on August 24th, Mr. Dunning fell in with 

 a countless swarm of SriniJii, which appeared to have all hatched 

 simultaneously, and to have at once commenced buzzing about in the 

 hot sunshine in a foolish kind of way, without caring to take food, for 

 most of them seemed to be mere shells without any substance inside. 

 Noticing that Mr. Home had recorded {Entom., iv., p. 356) the 

 occurrence of a swarm at Margate on the same day, which was said to 

 have included specimens of Syrphus balteatus, S. decoruf!, S. taeniatufi, 

 S. topiaiiiis SindEristalistena.r('>), Mr. Dunning placed in the hands of 

 ^Ir. Verrall, for examination, a few remnants of the Walton s\\'arm, 

 and had been favoured with the following note : " Having looked 

 closely through the diptera you sent me, I find that out of 56 or 57 

 specimens which I can recognise from the fragments, there are 27 

 S!J)p/ni.s rihesii, sixteen iS. cnrollae, eight S. pi/rastri, two S. lunu/er, 

 one ^S'. balteatus, one or two S. vitripennis {'>), and one S. pyrastri var. 

 iinicolor. This last variety is generally rare, but has this year appeared 

 in tolerable abundance. Mr. Verrall added that S. balteatus- was rare in 

 swarms, .S'. topiarius, if British, was extremely rare, and did not occur 

 in the collections of the British Museum or the Entomological club, 

 and that, if Kristalia tenax occurred in a swarm of Syrphidae, it could 

 only have got there accidentally as it might appear anywhere else 

 from its imiversal distribution. He had once come upon the tail-end 

 of a swarm of SyrpMdae, and the stragglers seemed to be nearly all S. 

 auricollnanditsvavietymaciilicoims. Eogers notes (Z'ooZ.jXxii., p. 9254) 

 that Si/rjiIiKs jiyrastri was swarming at Freshwater from August 14th to 

 16th, 1S()9, in countless thousands; on the 15th they passed over Fresh- 

 water in an eastward direction in large masses. At other places they 

 were seen continuously passing for six hours, and an orchard was 

 completely covered ; on the 17th at Freshwater Gate, the dead bodies 

 of these Hies formed a line on the cliffs more than four miles in length, 

 viz., from the Needles to the Monument ; Colwell shore presented 

 the same appearance, and millions were still flying there. At Yaimoutb 

 Bridge, when the rails were being painted, the rails were completely 



