THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 13 



Plymouth by an early afternoon train, and soon found 

 ourselves at Bickleigh Station, from whence we descended to 

 the valley below, crossed the river Plym, and walked up the 

 hill on the other side towards the Caun Quarry Woods, — the 

 locality we had previously fixed on for beating for larvae, 

 which were to be the chief object of our pursuit. On our 

 way we turned our attention to the hedges on each side of 

 us, and many common species of Geometrae were soon dis- 

 lodged, Larentia pectinitaria being perhaps the most abundant: 

 what a pest this is when one is mothing at dusk ; I have often 

 filled a dozen boxes or more with them, thinking they were 

 something else. It is, however, a very pretty moth, and how 

 nearly it resembles a piece of lichen as it sits with expanded 

 wings on a block of moss-covered granite. A little distance 

 further up the hill we came to a small patch of waste 

 ground, where a few^ stunted sloe-bushes grew, and these 

 were beaten in the hopes of obtaining larvae of Thecla 

 Betulae, but none were found, as it was rather too late in the 

 year for them, and the same bushes had been tried by one of 

 our party only a few days before, and three or four larvaj 

 taken. Presently a strange-looking moth responded to the 

 rattle of my stick, flew across the road, and settled in the 

 opposite hedge. I walked carefully towards it, and then saw 

 for the first time alive a beautiful specimen of Eurymene 

 dolobraria : it was a female, and was soon boxed, and I was 

 much pleased to make its acquaintance. Subsequently it 

 laid some eggs, which, on leaving Plymouth, I turned over to 

 my friend Mr. Bignell, but I have not heard whether he 

 succeeded in rearing any of them. Just before we reached 

 the woods we had to cross a small extent of heathy ground, 

 and here Bombyx Rubi was flying about freely in its usual 

 headlong manner, and we certainly thought it was rather late 

 in the season to find this species still on the wing. The 

 woods, at the point where we entered them, were composed 

 chiefly of young pollard oaks of about six or seven years' 

 growth, with here and there a few birch and buckthorn 

 bushes, and, in the whole course of my entomological career, 

 1 never saw such a sight as presented itself to our astonished 

 gaze when we first plunged into this wood. In many places 

 large patches of oaks were literally stripped of every leaf, and 

 innumerable larvae were to be seen wandering over the 



