12 THE entomologist's RECOKt). 



Homalota[Gijnepta)caerulea is excesssively abundant on the mud in 

 the early spring, before the vegetation is sufficiently grown to afford 

 good lodgment, and, later on, hundreds may be shaken out of the 

 Xafiturtuuiia.n([ pond-weeds. One Stcnm more than others I have always 

 noticed within a very few inches of the water, and never elsewhere ; 

 this is nitidiiisculm, which is so like about fifty others, that one might 

 pass it over as one of the commoner species, were it not for the 

 situation in which it is invariably found. The species of Lathrohium 

 appear to live on the town-and-country-house system, being found 

 basking in the sun on the mud-flats in the "season," and securely 

 ensconced in some warm corner at the base of the willows, on their 

 margins, in the winter. Praaocurh aucta I have taken walking demurely 

 along the surface of a drying ditch in a wood, and contrasting strikingly 

 with the movements of 7i('»/6i(/i?o» 6///«iirtiifwthatscamperedabouton all 

 sides of them. Having metaphorically chased and secured such of the ones 

 we want, as we are able, before they have disappeared down the cracks 

 formed in the mud by its consolidation, we will next turn over what bits of 

 board, sticks, and rubbish, generally the tide, or evaporation, may have 

 conveniently left for oiir advantage. Here we shall find Fterostichux 

 (int/iraci)iHs, ni<ivita, xtrcnuia^, and others of the genus, which, with 

 Clirinafdssor, dig out for themselves little chambers in the mud, much 

 as a dog makes a bed for himself before lying down in a thick copse — 

 by turning round and round, and tramping the soft mud into a hard 

 floor, pushing the walls against the board which generally forms the 

 roof of this curious little home. Other species which seek refuge by 

 day beneath rejectamenta are the common Prasocnrea, Erirhinua 

 acridulm, and one or two damp-loving species of Ocyjnis. Here 

 Hetcroceri, Bledii, DijurJiini, whose larvfe subsist upon those of the 

 two former, and Aphodiux plaijiatm have their subterranean burrows, 

 and Badistcr luiipustidatm should bo sought for. The ecdysis of 

 nearly all the voracious water-beetles, as well as of some Geodephaga 

 and Brachelytra, takes place within the mud of the margin, and the 

 pupa is securely tucked away from the outside world. A pond that 

 has become completely dry is still often a good locality for Hydrade- 

 PHAGA, which do not, as one would suppose, take wing to another 

 pond immediately, but may often be found an inch or two deep in the 

 mud. In this manner I have taken several species of A/jahus, and, in 

 brackish water, A. conspcrmfi. It is very probable that many species 

 of water-beetles pass the coldest part of the winter, although they seem 

 to hold the thermometer in less respect than most insects, quiescently 

 in the ooze. I found a colony of Agahm paludm^m and Parmts 

 aui'u'idatm under the damp, mud-covered bark of an old post standing 

 in a running stream, last February, and thought it a very unusual 

 situation for such essentially aquatic insects. One can hardly pass 

 without noticing those brilliantly bronze Geodephaga, so common on 

 the mud of all salt-water marshes, running about in what is termed 

 a " somewhat aimless way," by Mr. Walker, who goes on to say, of all 

 three species of the genus I'of/onus : " Here (Isle of Sheppey) they were 

 to be found, each beetle sitting with its head just at the level of the 

 soil, in a vertical burrow about half an inch deep ; the earth being 

 thrown out round the mouth of the burrow in a granular form, as by 

 a sand-hopper, or a P>lcdim, only in much more regular fashion" 

 {E.M.M., June, 1896). What is technically known as " swilling " 



