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Note on the relations Ijetween colour and cdihUlty in larvce. — It has often been 

 said that birds do not feed upon larvic which are gaily coloured. A dozen years 

 since I planted a quantity of Hounds-tongue in the garden, and placed larva; of • 

 Callimorpha dominida upon it, and the species completely established itself here. 1 

 This spring there were hundreds of caterpillars ; but, about three weeks since, I J 

 noticed that their numbers were decreasing, and could not account for it. At last I , 

 found that a pair of large tits {Parus major), which had a nest in a hole in a tree 

 just outside the garden, fetched them away to feed their young ones. Now this is 

 one of the brightest-coloured larva; that I know of. The larvie of the Zygcenw are 

 also gaily-coloured, and they are the favourite food of Cuckoos. — H. Doubleday, 

 Epping : iOth May, 1872. 



Practical hint for Lepidopterists.—Th&t popidar writer, Mr. Edmund Yates, in 

 a tale called " The Yellow Flag " now being published in " All the Year Round " 

 (8th Jime), enunciates a statement to the effect that one of his characters " woidd 

 " have found the winter evenings dull, had it not been for the excitement ol perpetu- 

 " ally re-arranging his large collection of moths and butterflies, renewing their corks 

 " and pins," &c. The italics are ours. — Eds. 



On a fungoid epidemic among Xanthochlorus (tenellus, Wied. ?). — On the 13th 

 August, 1871, I happened to examine closely some oak bushes at Shirley, when I 

 was struck by the vast number of minute dead Diptera, all belonging to one species, 

 which were affixed in the posture of life to the under-side of the leaves. At first I 

 gave but little attention to the matter, being engaged in researches of another kind ; 

 but, when branch after branch on being turned up revealed the same ghostly assem- 

 blage, it struck me that I had come across the trail of a disease, like the one which 

 Empjisa muscce causes among domestic flies. Further examination proved this 

 surmise to be weU founded. The area infected comprised a triangular rising piece 

 of ground about an acre in extent, covered with a rank and mixed undergrowth, 

 principally oak, interspersed with scattered timber trees of different sorts. A dense 

 fir-wood formed the high back ground, while two roads, backed by steep banks, high 

 palings, and a row of oaks, shut in the remaining two sides of the triangle, and 

 were joined in one deep gully below. 



A deserted half-overgrown gravel-pit, with large pools of rain water, occupied 

 the comer nearest the junctions of the roads, just below the infected area. At the 

 junction of the two roads below the gravel-pit, a considerable number of felled oaks 

 were piled up. The spots where they had been felled were still marked by the 

 discs of their roots, filled with the decaying chips, macei-ating in rain water. The 

 weather at the time was warm and showery. Aspect due South. The prevailing 

 local direction of the current of air, near the surface of the ground, was up the guUy, 

 across the gravel-pit, and over the infected area. I tested this repeatedly by setting 

 free some spiders' webs. Having made tliis preliminary survey, I descended into 

 the gully, and examined the oaks and all surroundings, but could not find a single 

 one of the flies either dead or alive. The interior of the gravel-pit and the palings 

 had their turn next, with a negative result, as not a fly was to be seen. I then 

 examined the lateral borders of the pit nearest the roads, and here, on the under-side 



