NOTES, CAPTURES, ETC. 75 



stroke of the net. On the llth they were very plentiful, and on the 12th 

 there were very many, but by the 18th they were all gone. The moths 

 appeared twice each evening, soon after sunset, and again about 10 o'clock, 

 p.m. Mr. Newman speaks of this moth in his work on ' British Moths,' 

 as having two broods, one in June, and another in August. I have looked 

 in vain for it in both months here, but have never seen or taken them 

 excepting in July ; the earliest capture being on the 7th of that month. I 

 have never taken them after the '^7th of July. Piusia pidchrina, p. iota, 

 Hahrostola triplasia, Odonestes potatoria, Noctiia /estiva, were also very 

 plentiful in the same place in 1887; while this year I have worked the 

 locality much more frequently than last, but have only succeeded in taking 

 six P. chnjsitis, the first of them being taken on the 18th July, and five 

 P. iota, two being very small. I only got one each of N. /estiva, H. 

 triplasia, andi P. j'ulchrina, but no 0. potatoria. T send this note thinking 

 it might be of some interest respecting the remarks of Mr. W. White, on 

 the effect of meteorological conditions upon insect life (Entom xxi. 217). — 

 W. T. Eains ; 383, Ladypool Road, Sparkbrook, Birmingham. 



OxYPTiLUS TKUCRir. — In his note on this species [ante p. 34), Mr. 

 South seems to have overlooked the fact that heterodactyla was De Villers' 

 name, not Haworth's. Careful as Haworth always was, we cannot surely 

 accept a solitary specimen so labelled by him as sufficient proof of our 

 teucrii being De Villers' heterodactyla of 1789, to justify tlie rejection of its 

 present well-known name. — C. A. Briggs ; 55, Lincoln's Inn Fields. 

 February 5, 1889. 



Abundance of some Lepidoptera. — Notwithstanding the backward- 

 ness of the season of 1888, several species, although a little late, were of 

 extremely common occurrence in the New Forest. Macroylossa fuci/ormis 

 appeared throughout June last in utter profusion in a favourite locality, 

 which I visited at least three times during the first and second week of the 

 month with Mr. McRae, of Bournemouth. I believe others can give similar 

 experience concerning the abundance of this species. Catocala promissa 

 and C. sp>onsa, which emerged early in August, were also exceedingly plen- 

 tiful again in a great many parts of the Forest, though C. 2Jroiiiissa was 

 much the commoner of the two, and the specimens exceptionally large, 

 which was the reverse in 1887. I had very little difficulty in taking in one 

 evening alone sixty picked specimens, leaving many others on the trees, 

 sometimes noticing six to eight on a patch of sugar. On June 2lith Mr. 

 Druitt and 1 had a day together in the Forest, and found the little black 

 Gnophria ruhricollis in good condition and in very fair numbers, at rest on 

 bracken ferns, sometimes in the very thick of the wood. One fact notice- 

 able was their curious manner of jerking themselves upon the ground and 

 feigning death when we were approaching them. Should one happen to be 

 unacquainted with this peculiarity, the insects might thus easily escape 

 detection. — J. M. Adye ; Somerford Grange, Christchurch. 



Lepidoptera in Guernsey and Sark. — I think Mr. W. H. Blaber's 

 description of Sark as "a bleak and barren island " (Entom. xxi. 324) is 

 likely to mislead, and may prevent some collectors from visiting it. All 

 who have hitherto written about Sark consider it remarkably fertile and the 

 following extract from ' Inglis' Channel Islands' is an exact description: — 

 " Although Sark is usually called a table laud, it is intersected by deep, 



