ft8 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



margin of the wing some way before the apex ; and the fourth a short 

 distance behind it. 



The female closely resembles the male in every respect, only it has the 

 abdomen furnished with a short pointed shining black oviduct. 



This small species is closely allied to Phytomyza nigra, Mgn., 

 and to P. ohscurella, Fin. The description of the former is so 

 short that its identity cannot be determined with certainty ; but 

 the knees of all the legs are described as being pale. P. ohscu- 

 rella is said to differ from Chcerophylli, by having knees likewise 

 pale, the abdomen shining black, and the ends of the fourth 

 longitudinal veins of the wings close to the apex. 



These little flies shrivel up and alter so much when dry, that 

 comparisons between old preserved specimens are of little use ; 

 descriptions taken from recently killed examples must be con- 

 sulted for the purpose of identification. 



R. H. Meade. 



RHOPALOCERA AT WIESBADEN. 

 By R. M. Prideaux. 



Wiesbaden is situated on the right bank of the Rhine, about 

 Sg miles from the river. The tract of country lying between the 

 town and the Rhine consists entirely of cultivated ground, bare 

 hedgeless tracts of which are studded with apple, pear, walnut- 

 trees, &c., and divided up by cart-tracks and paths. North-west 

 of the town, however, lie the Taunus Hills, being a wooded 

 district intersected by broad well- watered valleys, and it is here 

 that collecting can be most profitably pursued. The woods on 

 the hills consist for the most part of beech and oak ; occasional 

 patches of fir and larch being planted here and there. The 

 valleys that lie between the hills are very fertile, and watered by 

 one or more small clear streams. There is no undergrowth 

 allowed to grow in the woods, and there are very few hedges, the 

 absence of which, both as " cover " for the imagines and food for 

 their larvae, doubtless accounts for the scarcity of some kinds of 

 Lepidoptera, which is especially noticeable among the Geometrse. 

 A great variety of flowers and coarse plants, especially Umbel- 

 liferae, grow in the green valleys, which are always mown down 

 for hay during July. The late spring of 1888, and the excep- 

 tionally wet and cold summer that followed it, render the 

 experiences of that one season hardly representative of what one 

 might expect to meet with under more ordinary conditions, both 

 as to times of occurrence and numbers of specimens. In the 

 former, especially, I found that my own observations seldom 

 coincided with those set forth in a work — ' The Lepidoptera of 

 the District of Wiesbaden,' by Dr. Adolph Rossler, which was 



