﻿NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 21 



An Afternoon in South Eastern France. — At the end of July 

 I started with a friend for a short walking tour in the Eastern 

 Pyrenees ; but the sudden outbreak of the war compelled us to return 

 abruptly, after we had had no more than one afternoon's walk (on 

 Saturday, August 1st), from Narbonne to Sigean. As we were on the 

 high i-oad nearly all the time we did little collecting, except during a 

 brief halt for an hour in a clover field, where we took the following 

 insects : Pieris vianni, Pontia daplidice (worn), CoUas eclusa, 

 Pyrameis cardui, Melitcea cinxia, If. phcebe (small), Melanargia 

 lachesis (worn), Satyrus circc (worn), S. fidia, Ejnncjjhele jurtina 

 (worn), E. ida, Polyommatus thersites, and two other " blues" which 

 are too worn to identify with certainty, but are probably P. medon 

 and P. escheri. We had an exciting week of it on our return, 

 especially at Cette (where I was arrested as a suspected German spy, 

 and, having no passport or papers of any kind, I had great difficulty 

 in convincing the police of my bona fides), Lyons, Paris, and Le Havre. 

 The insects I took will always have for me an interest far in advance of 

 their real value : but my object in writing this note is to record the 

 capture of these species, some of which, as I am told by Mr. Eowland- 

 Brown, who kindly looked them over for me, are not common in 

 South-eastern France. — F. A. Oldaker, M.A.; F.E.S. ; The Ked 

 House, Haslemere, November 28th, 1914. 



EuROis occulta in Essex. — In reference to Mr. Stiff's note on 

 the occurrence of Eurois occulta in Essex (Entom. xlvii. p. 323), it may 

 interest him to know that the four specimens he mentions as having 

 been captured near Leigh-on-Sea are by no means the first recorded 

 Essex specimens. As long ago as 1869, Mr. Meldola (' Ento- 

 mologist,' vol. iv. p. 325) says, " I took two fine specimens of this 

 moth at sugar in Epping Forest on August 26th." Again, Henry 

 Doubleday, in vol. v. p. 420, in sending a list of insects captured in 

 his garden at Epping, says, " I also took Calocamim vetusta, and a 

 very fine Aplccta occulta. It must be about twenty-five years since 

 I took two specimens of this moth " [presumably at the same place] . 

 On July 29th, 1883, I took a single specimen at rest on the trunk of 

 an oak near Brentwood, and I was told some two or three years 

 afterwards that it w^as not very scarce at sugar there, but I never had 

 an opportunity of testing the truth of the statement. I may add that 

 this specimen was of the pale southern type, wdiereas those recorded 

 by Mr. Stiff, and taken not very many miles away, are all of the dark 

 variety. — A. Thurnall ; Wanstead, December 8th, 1914. 



EuROis OCCULTA IN EssEX. — In the ' Journal of Proceedings ' of 

 the Essex Field Club (vol. i. p. xxii.) occurs the following passage in 

 the report of the meeting of the club held on June 26th, 1880: — 

 "Mr. Meldola exhibited Aplecta occulta (dark aberration), Aplecta 

 tincta and Noctua glareosa, all captured in the woods near Wood- 

 food, some years ago. Mr. English remarked that glareosa occurred 

 occasionally in some parts of the Forest, but that A. occulta was a 

 great rarity. Mr. Doubleday had once bred a batcli of thirty or 

 forty specimens, but all of the grey tint common in southern speci- 

 mens, whereas Mr. Meldola's example was similar to the dark 



