2^ [June, 



wished to verify a statement by Mr. C. Hcaly, in the Entomologist, vol. ii, p. 129, 

 and again mentioned in the Nat. Hist. Tineina, vol. xi, p. 310, which has always 

 seemed rather puzzling to me, viz. : that the larva; when full fed cut out their oval 

 cases, descend to the ground, and convey their cases under the surface of the earth, 

 and there change to the pupa state. This habit in a larva which is apodal appeared 

 to me most extraordinary, and to test it I placed all the leaves I had in several glass 

 jars with open tops like ordinary tumblers, with some fine earth at the bottom taken 

 from the hedge where I obtained the larva;, I then buried all the jars half down in a 

 box of earth so that no light should get to the sides and left them for three months. 

 I then very carefully examined the sides of the glass jars, but could not detect a 

 single case below the surface of the earth. I then carefully took out the layers of 

 leaves in all the jars, and found the cases were all concealed between the decaying 

 leaves in exactly the same way as with its congener TreitschTcielJa. In some instances 

 there were as many as twenty cases all close together in one patch. After carefully 

 taking all the leaves out of each jar, I found numbers of cases on the surface of the 

 earth, I then removed all these cases from the surface, and turned the earth out of 

 each jar on to a sheet of paper, but with all my careful searching I did not find in 

 any of the jars a single case that was beneath the surface, so that I am quite con- 

 vinced there must have been some error in Mr. Healy's observations, or that the jam- 

 pots which he generally used must have been shaken by some one unknown to him, 

 so that the cases became mixed with the earth. lie also says the species is very 

 difficult to breed, whinh, again, is different to my experience, for by forcing in a tem- 

 perature between 60° and 70° I have, during last month and the early part of this, 

 had them emerging most freely. — Geo. Elisha, 122, Shepherdess Walk, City Road, 

 N. : April \Uh, 1886. 



Cosmopteryx Scriha'ieUa hred freely at Stettin. — We have now at Stettin all the 

 known European species of the genus Cosmopteryx, since in the autumn of 1885 wc 

 found there the larvae of Scriha'ieUa, and in far greater plenty than those of Lienigiella, 

 for in spite of the most careful search we found scarcely more than 30 of the last 

 named species, whereas of Scriha'ieUa we collected several hundred larv£B. These we 

 found in individual plants of reed {Artindo phragmites), which grew in sheltered 

 situations under young fir-trees {Pinus sylvesiris) at the edge of a nearly dry ditch 

 in a sandy locality ; on some plants there were as many as 50 mines ! The larva 

 winters head downwards in the lowermost part of the mine, which here tapers to 

 merely the breadth of the larva ; this slender portion of the mine is from 15 to 20 

 mm. long, but sometimes has even a length of 60 to 80 mm. A mine of Lienigiella 

 which I found at the same time was perceptibly broader, but shorter than those of 

 Scriha'ieUa. Besides, the larva of Lienigiella does not pass the winter at the narrow 

 lower end of its mine, but nearer the middle of the mine, where it has a breadth of 

 more than 10 mm. One can besides readily distinguish the two larvce, if we compare 

 them whilst they are feeding in fresh green leaves of the reed. The figure of the 

 larva of Lienigiella, given in Stainton's "Natural History of the Tineina," vol. xii, 

 PI. i, fig. 1, is a very good representation of that larva. The larva of Scriha'ieUa has 

 an average length of 3^ mm., and is smaller than the larva of Lienigiella ; it is 

 greenish-white, without markings, only the dorsal vessel is pale brown ; the head is 

 rather darker, but yet of a pale brown, with only the margins darker. The mark on 



