SCIENTIFIC NOTES. 



3oa 



from an unwillingness to travel perhaps, individual larvae go on "short 

 commons," while the majority are feeding as usual. And not un- 

 frequently, something, in the plant itself and not in the intiuence of 

 weather, makes the pabulum, which falls to a particular larva, lacking 

 in nutriment. Lampidea hoeticua seems to afford an illustration of this, 

 at least when feeding on ( 'nlhttea arban'sceus. We have had another 

 visit from this migrant this year, and it has been common during 

 September. My own observations entirely coincide with Mr. Baker's 

 about the variable size of this insect and its probable cause (ride Tutt's 

 Jh-itinh LcpidopU'va, vol. iv., p. 344.) A larva seldom, if ever, leaves 

 the seed pod upon which it first began to feed until just before pupating. 

 If therefore it has luck and a fat pod, it may become a fine imago, if 

 on the contrary the portion is meagre, the result is a specimen of 

 diminished size. It is hardly necessary to add any corroborative 

 testimony to anything Dr. Chapman writes or suggests, but experience 

 of this has convinced me of the truth of his hypothesis — (that />. hoeticm 

 in the north perishes every winter, even if it gets a footing in the 

 summer). I watched several females, both in the open and in captivity, 

 laying eggs on the Calhttea, and also searched the bushes and found 

 eggs. In every case the QQg, or eggs, were laid on the /Imrcr, and 

 nearly always upon, or just above, the calyx. The newly hatched larva 

 bored at once into the centre of the flower, working its way down to 

 the midrib of the keel, where the seed was to form, and upon which it 

 would live, enclosed in the bladder pod. But except one that I have 

 in the house now under observation, and supply with a new pod when 

 needed, all the larvtc out of doors must have perished, for the flowers, 

 or half-formed seed pods, and leaves have fallen with the first touch of 

 cold in the last days of September. In no case were eggs laid on the 

 wood of the tree to hibernate until the spring.— Rev. Frank E. Lowe, 

 M.A., F.E.S., St. Stephen's Vicarage, Guernsey. 



A Variety of Euchlok euphenoides. — After reading Lieut. -Col. 

 Manders' note in the October number of the Record I examined my 

 series of this insect. I found /'.'. euphcnoiileN very abundant last 

 summer at Vernet-les-Bains, Pyrenees Orientales, and I have kept 65 

 specimens from that place, of which 46 are males and 19 females. On 

 the secondaries of the males I can find no trace whatever of the 

 marginal orange coloration referred to by tbe Colonel, but most of the 

 females show a very slight orange suffusion on the costa, though in 

 only one case is it at all pronounced. In a female K. eapheno, the 

 only one I took during my visit to Algeria, last year, the same slight 

 orange suffusion is noticeable. So far, then, as my observations go 

 the variation of which Lieut. -Col. Manders speaks is, if not absent, at 

 any rate only very slightly developed at Vernefc, where the climate is 

 remarkably dry, the hygrometer registering a mean humidity of 59°, 

 while the average number of rainy days is only 37 per annum. The 

 altitude is about 700 metres. I took these figures from the pamphlets 

 issued by I'Etablissement. In my Vernet E. euphenoides the most 

 noticeable variation is in size, and the difference is greater in the 

 females than in the males. The smallest female measures Slinm. 

 from tip to tip of the expanded wings, and the largest 45mm., a range 

 of 14mm. in a series of 19 specimens, while the extremes in the males 

 are 32mm. and 41mm. There is also marked variation in the colour 

 of the apical spot in the females, in some the orange being most 



