1S80.] 233 



bred ; Sarrothripa revayana, at sugar, and bred ; Dichelia Orotiana and Sideria 

 achatana, beaten out of hedge, the latter also bred from hawthorn ; Sericoris bifas- 

 ciana; Phoxopteryx Lundana ; GrapJioUtha ncBvana, bred from holly; Pcedisca 

 oppressana, on trunks of aspen ; Coccyx nanana, abundant ; Retinia Buoliana 

 and R. sylvestrana, a few of each; Carpocapsa splendana and Catoptria Juliana, 

 bred from acorns. 



Altogether 336 species, without including the TiNEiE, of which Family I only 

 took a few, although there were many to be obtained. 



I may add that 151 species were also found in the larval stage, and 74 in pupae. 

 —Id. 



Economic Entomology at Worcester. — About twenty years ago I and another 

 collector, one with mothing-net in hand, were walking by a cottage at Crowle, when 

 we were invited by an ancient rustic, who seemed to be near eighty years old, to 

 enter his dwelling, and look at his " ob-owlud." On entering he reached from a shelf 

 a large match box, and took off the lid, disclosing to view a fine Arctia caja, 

 imago, together with some leaves put into the box for it to subsist on. The old man's 

 face brightened up as he exhibited his prize, like a child's when showing his first 

 capture. 



Some seven years since the larvae of Nematus rihesii were very troublesome here, 

 and had nearly defoliated the bushes in the garden of a neighbour who had spent 

 nearly all her life in the midst of gardens and nurseries, and whose husband was a 

 gardener by trade, but then decrepit: on being spoken to about the " grubs," she 

 replied that " they came out of the ashes (burnt coal) she had placed in the garden." 

 Trying to disabuse her was useless, and equally useless to advise her to destroy the 

 larv£e. 



In 1876 complaints reached me of some " great black grubs, as long as one's 

 finger," that were making webs on the fruit trees, and which, if not destroyed in 

 time by cutting off the boughs they were on, would destroy all the leaves and fruit 

 on the trees. With some difficulty I induced one of the complainants to procure 

 me some of the " big black grubs," and was not a little surprised when an egg cup 

 was bi'ought containing two larvae of our old acquaintance Bombyx neustria, A man 

 of some cultivation and musical reputation in the city, possessing a well-fruited 

 garden, was silly enough to saw ofE (by advise of one of the knowing ones) a branch 

 of one of his plum trees, to save the rest of the tree from the devourers. 



The red-runner (Phaseobis) is subject to drop many of its blossoms without 

 producing pods : the cause of this is said to be a " fly that bites (or ' takes ') them." 



During the recent summer season I heard much of the " wire-worm," which was 

 destroying many of the garden peas and other plants ; but none of the worms shown 

 to me were what Coleopterists know as wire-worms, a few were larvae of Diptera, and 

 all the others were Myriopoda. — J. E. Fletcher, Happy Land, Worcester : De- 

 cember, 1879. 



Notes on British Dijotera of the Family OscinidcB. — Dr. Schiner, in his " Cata- 

 logus systematicus Dipterorum Europte," gives one hundred and eighty species of this 

 Family as found in Europe ; probably about fifty have occurred in the British 

 Isles. The following notes may be useful. The two species marked * have not before 

 been recorded as British. 



