32 HYMENOPTERA. 



observe a tendency on the part of some to allow little less 

 than the contents of most of our modern genera to rank 

 as a species ; the order itself, consequently, falling into what 

 we now consider to constitute a genus. 



It was our province last year to record an unusual scarcity 

 of the aculeate tribe ; the season of 1856 produced them in 

 tolerable abundance generally ; but it is a remarkable fact, 

 that the Vespidce, which were scarce in 1855, have been 

 still more so in 1856. Indeed persons, not Entomologists, 

 in certain districts have remarked their scarcity. We have 

 observed, that, in seasons when fruit is abundant, wasps are 

 abundant also. This is what might indeed be expected. The 

 same warm genial weather which causes your fruit trees to 

 blossom, rouses the wasps from their winter's torpidity. 

 When this is followed by severe, cold and wet weather, 

 with sharp frosty nights, the blossoms are nipt and the fruit 

 crop destroyed. The same causes prove destructive to the 

 Vespidce. In limited districts I have been told that wasps 

 have been plentiful, but, generally, I have ascertained, they 

 have been unusually scarce. 



Bees, on the contrary, have been abundant; and in the 

 Isle of Wight, which I believe " to surpass all other localities 

 in this country for its richness in Hymenopterous treasures," 

 their abundance was such, that in one spot at Freshwater, 

 Mr. Bond informed me, that he had no doubt he could have 

 captured upwards of a hundred specimens of a species of 

 Halictus, by one swoop of his net. In the month of April, 

 we observed a greater number of Andrena Clarkella on 

 Hampstead Heath than we ever remember to have observed 

 on any previous occasion; it would appear indeed to have 

 been unusually abundant in many other situations, as several 

 correspondents forwarded the species to us from different 

 parts of the country. 



