1895.1 181 



to reach the perfect state, a proportion of larvae collected even in 

 September producing moths the same year if kept indoors, though in 

 a cool place. The rest, however, of the autumn leaf-mining larvae, 

 LithocolletidcB, NepticuJidcB, &c., seemed to be exceptionally scarce, 

 and such was also the experience of friends in other parts of England, 

 both in the North, Midlands, and South ; perhaps it is hardly to be 

 wondered at when one recalls the ceaseless torrents of rain, and the 

 absence of sunshine, that prevailed when the imagines of the earlier 

 broods should have been pairing and ovipositing. 



Expeditions to happy hunting grounds outside Purbeck were not 

 very profitable. From the New Forest district I brought home a few 

 larvae of Asphalia ridens, some four or five of Phycis rohorella found 

 spun up for pupation in a cluster of cocoons under the rotten bark 

 of a long-felled oak log (How they all arrived there is a mystery 

 to me !), and about half a dozen each of Tortrix cratcegana and Pcedisca 

 rufimitrana, but there was a far greater dearth of insect life than I 

 have ever before seen there in the middle of June. At Bloxworth 

 (Dorset) the Eev. O. P. Cambridge, with whom I was staying just 

 before Midsummer, caught one Penthina fuUgana and a solitary 

 Eupoecilia Oeyeriana, besides which our bag included a few Scoparia 

 pallida, Ancylis diminutana, Pcedisca hilunana, Stigmonota Germar- 

 ana, Hb. (2), Epermenia IlUgerella (1), and a case of Coleopkora 

 paUiatcUa, found spun up on a sallow leaf, which yielded me a moth 

 in due course. At Portland Scoparia mercurella var. portlandica 

 (totally distinct from Sc. phoeoleuca, Zell., which is unknown in Britain) 

 was locally much commoner than usual, and I succeeded in boxing 

 an example of the rare Tinea subfilella, which was at rest in a crevice 

 of the rock. During the last week of November I had the pleasure 

 of an introduction to Cheimatobia horeata in Kent, where it seems to 

 have been more abundant than usual, and got both sexes in fine con- 

 dition : they were mostly boxed off the birch bushes and surrounding 

 brushwood after dark, and a fair number were taken in cop. in 

 sheltered spots. 



In the above jottings on several of the more interesting Le- 

 pidoptera met with during the past year, it is needless to allude to 

 one or two species about which I hope to contribute separate notes, 

 but it may be added that, thanks to help received, chiefly through the 

 generosity of friends, from other parts of Britain, my breeding cages 

 produced such welcome things as ilfeZiVcert Cinxia {1) , Endromis versi- 

 color, LopTiopteryx carmelitn,N'otodonta chaonia,N. trimacula, Acronycta 

 ahii, Tcenioctiiiipn huicographn, T. uiiniosa, PericalJia syringaria, Euime- 



