1882.] 187 



By the beginning of June, the spring moths that are common in the forest had 

 passed away, and the ova they deposited had produced larvae. These creatures were 

 in myriads on the oaks ; and when, in the first week of July, their ravages had 

 reached a maximum, many an acre of woodland could not show a tree with more 

 foliage on it than there would be in December. Larvae-beating, however, turned out 

 to be an extremely disagreeable occupation, chiefly on account of the numbers of a 

 large dark bronze-green Pentatoma (?) the stick dislodged from the branches, so that 

 1 I made only one trial of that kind of work, but from it I ascertained that the 

 devouring host consisted in the main of "stung" caterpillars, and, accordingly, do not 

 expect that an abnormal quantity of imagos will appear next year. A reference to 

 the note-book shows that from July to the conclusion of the season, captures just 

 here have been below the average, and consist principally of the commoner kinds of 

 the Heterocera. The Rhopalocera, however, of which twenty-four species have 

 been observed in the district, did not altogether fail to add to my stock of duplicates, 

 though the only one taken was V. c-album, an insect I have looked for to no purpose 

 hitherto in several localities. It was a charming pastime, therefore, one day last 

 • September to single it out from a mixed crowd of urticce, po/yckloros, Io, and Ata- 

 lanta, and to box a long series of it in good order, a mile or two from here, making 

 the fiftieth of our Diurni with which I have had to do afield. 



With respect to Coleoptera, many of those species I have recorded as taken in 

 1878 — 80 have occurred again this year under similar conditions ; so such only are 

 enumerated as in their capture present some point of difference, as compared with 

 their predecessors. Thus Cychrus rostratus occurred by stone-turning; RMzophagns 

 cribratus by beating whitethorn blossom ; Corymbites pectinicornis by searching 

 grass-stems ; Lasia globosa by examining felled trunks. Also some mention must 

 be made of the extraordinary abundance of Calosoma inquisitor and Silpha ^-punc- 

 tata. As an instance, one afternoon in June I bottled of the former more than a 

 hundred examples, and dozens of the latter. The majority of them were either 

 crawling or motionless on the trunks and branches or running along the ground, but 

 a fair number were seen flying in the sunshine. These insects appear to be some- 

 what local, as they were common only in a comparatively small area. The check 

 they exercised upon the devastating power of Lepidopterous larvae was very palpable. 

 In those portions of the forest in which the trees were stripped of foliage, I did not 

 notice a single specimen of the larger beetle. 



A note on some species hitherto not recorded, to the best of my belief, from 

 here may be of interest, especially as the number of Coleopterists appears to be 

 rapidly increasing, possibly because the study of the Order is so very attractive, 

 from the diversity of structure and economy of its members, or because, at present, 

 there is little liability of continental stocks being planted out, and their offspring 

 being foisted upon one as indigenous. In carcase, Silpha thoracica ; in toad-stool, 

 Qyrophcena gentilis ; by beating foliage and blossom, Paramecosoma melanocephala, 

 Rhamphus flavicomis, Magdalinus barbicomis ; from Sparganium, Donacia linearis ; 

 by sweeping, Philonthus sanguinolentus, Cercus bijmstulatus, Galeruca viburni ; on 

 stumps, Quedius scitus, Platypus cylindrus ; under birch bark, Plpurcea parvula ; 

 on felled timber, Brachytarsus scabrosus ; in decayed wood, Pteryx suturalis ; in 

 moss, Mycetoporus clavicornis. — A. E. Hodgson, Coleford, Grloucs. : November, 1881. 



