56 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



Mr. P. J. Barraud kindly took charge of them for me, and nine 

 young larvse resulted. These were fed up on birch, sleeved out 

 in my garden, and left pretty much to their own devices. Six of 

 them successfully pupated at the end of June in some blocks of 

 peat placed in the bottom of the sleeve, and I suppose it is 

 possible I may have to wait four or five years before the moths 

 emerge. My short series of ten "sprawlers" exhibits consider- 

 able variation in the intensity of colouring, one male being 

 exceptionally light, while in the ground colour of another speci- 

 men (a female) there is a suffusion of reddish brown. The 

 A. flavicornis, of which a number were taken in March and 

 April, are of the usual Eannoch form (var. scotica of Staudinger, 

 I think), many of them handsome, boldly-marked insects with 

 large silver-grey patches on the costa. They vary in the number 

 and intensity of the transverse markings, and lack the greenish- 

 grey appearance of our southern forms. Sugaring during these 

 early months of the year did not yield very good results, only a 

 few hybernated specimens of Cerastes vaccinii, Scopelosoma satel- 

 litia and Calocampa exoleta appearing. The weather was cold 

 and discouraging, and at the end of the month of March I with- 

 drew my collector for a time ; but about the middle of April 

 I sent him back to Perthshire, with the object, chiefly, of getting 

 a series of Nyssia lapponaria, and this proved to be one of the 

 most successful quests of a bad year, notwithstanding the con- 

 tinual rain and sleet which prevailed. Mr. Esson describes it as 

 rough work searching for N. lapponaria amid bogs and boulders, 

 the long wet vegetation proving very destructive to shoe-leather. 

 The insects are to be discovered settled on the branches of 

 heather and bog-myrtle, but may also be found on posts and 

 fences. After a fall of snow the apterous females resemble little 

 snowballs, and are not easily seen. Several travelled to Hert- 

 fordshire safely in chip-boxes, and they deposited eggs freely in 

 the folds of crumpled pieces of muslin ; between the layers of 

 fragments of corrugated packing-board with which I supplied 

 them ; in the crevices of chip-boxes ; or, indeed, in any cranny 

 into which they could insect their long ovipositors. This is not 

 an easy species to rear. I distributed a good many ova, but it is 

 to be feared that few pupse have resulted, and it remains to be 

 seen from how many of these moths will emerge safely. A few 

 varieties of Tceniocampa gothica and T. instabilis were taken 

 during April and May. Lohophora carpinata was abundant, and 

 in the latter month a few nice varieties of Cidaria suffumata were 

 secured. Bad weather continued to interfere with collecting, 

 but a very satisfactory lot of Anarta cordigera made prospects 

 appear more cheerful. On May 19th, in company with Mr. T. 

 Salvage — who, I believe, was working at Eannoch for a syndicate 

 — Mr. Esson found A. cordigera flying " all over the hills," in a 

 gale of wind, which made them difficult to catch. Eeturning at 



