6 [June, 



hiding-place for small beetles ; there are no tussocks or compact roots 

 where they can hibernate — moss and everything else is all dry and 

 dusty together. 



If I went out to hunt as I should do in England, I should probably 

 not see a Homalota, perhaps not even a Philonthus ; but in haystack 

 refuse I should get one or two specimens of Corticaria, a Pcederus, and 

 a few of the exceedingly common Ancylopus. The chances would be 

 against my seeing Stenus, Quedius, Cryptopliayus, or Atomaria. In a 

 general way, there are no beetles to be had ; a few only may be found 

 under the small loosened pieces of bark on JPlanera acuminata — a mode 

 of collecting familiar to entomologists who have wintered at Cannes 

 or Mentone. But if I go to the hills and bluffs, or to the plantations, 

 seeking out the sheltered spots and working round the edges of ponds 

 or reservoirs (where water is permanently stored for irrigation), I find 

 nothing, all is dry down to the water's edge. In the forests, at alti- 

 tudes of 2500 and 3000 feet, more can be done in barking the beeches 

 and oaks, and by knocking the large decayed trees to pieces over a 

 cloth ; but even in the mountains there is no moisture in the moss, 

 and nothing living inhabits it. 



The 22nd and 23rd December I spent in an elevated forest about 

 50 miles from this, and if I mention the genera I found, it will show 

 the character of my captures. All occurred in fair numbers, and 

 many abundantly. Cucujus, Brontes, Pediacus, La3mopliloeus, Prosto- 

 mis, Cicones, Mliysodes, Plndoplilceus, Tarphius, JElater, Platypus, Try- 

 podendron, a few Piestini, and two tree Homalota?. Of the described 

 Coleoptera of Japan at this time, not one per cent, are Homalotce ; and 

 although I have recently added a large number to the list, I believe 

 there are not more than four or five (amongst the new ones) of this 

 genus ; yet, in spring and summer, I have been very careful not to 

 neglect the smallest Braclielytra. A few Homalotce or Oocypodce put 

 into a pill-box and stored in a dry room, will soon be dead, and the 

 dryness of the winter here corresponds with the pill-box condition of 

 such beetles. It might be thought that in a country like this, where 

 insects attain, as a rule, greater dimensions than in Europe, the smaller 

 ones would give place to the larger, but second thoughts will not 

 favour this view, and I am inclined to refer the scarcity of little beetles 

 wholly and simply to the dryness in the winter season, and I believe 

 that on investigation the Tinece vti\l be found to exist here in the same 

 proportion only. Last spring and summer I obtained very few small 

 Staphylinidce from fungi, yet these vegetables teemed with insect-life, 

 chiefly Heteromera and small Erotylidce, but I only saw two Stapliyli- 



