18 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



Annual ' for 1855 (p. 38), where also are mentioned a specimen taken 

 at Mickleham, and others " taken in various localities." In 185G one 

 was obtained at Exeter, and one in the Isle of Wight. The summer 

 of 1859 was a hot one, as were the two previous summers, and many 

 records of the occurrence of II. armigera were enumerated in the 

 ' Annual ' for 1860 ; the localities being Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, 

 Edmonton, Isle of Wight, Ramsgate, Torquay, Weston-super-mare, 

 Worthing, and other places. Between the year last mentioned and 

 1871 one specimen or more seem to have been captured each year, and 

 chiefly on the south and south-west coasts, but one example was 

 reported from Scarborough in 18CG, and one from Wakefield in 1871. 

 Turning now to the ' Entomologist ' I do not find any further records 

 until 1876, when a specimen occurred at Bristol, and in the following 

 year three captures were announced — one at Hartlepool, one in 

 Gloucestershire, and one on the Kentish coast. In 1881 there is 

 another Gloucestershire record ; in 1890 the occurrence of a specimen 

 at Chatham is reported ; in 1895 one example is notified from Tun- 

 bridge Wells ; and, finally, we have the capture mentioned by 

 Mr. Druitt in the present number. Mr. J. Jenner Weir, in 1869, bred 

 two specimens from larva? found feeding on tomatoes, and mentioned, 

 when exhibiting them before the Entomological Society of London, 

 that an importation of tomatoes from Spain and Portugal had been 

 greatly damaged by a number of green larva?, with black lines and 

 spots, which fed in the fruit. 



Twenty-three years later Mr. Arkle (Entom. xxv. 237) again 

 refers to the importation of H. armigera in the larval state in consign- 

 ments of tomatoes from Valencia arriving at Liverpool in the months 

 of June and July. The moths in this case appeared on July 27th 

 (two) and Aug. 15th (one). The same writer (Entom. xxvii. 138) 

 records two imagines, bred July 9th, from larva? obtained from 

 Valencia tomatoes in June, 1893 ; in 1896 he received about twenty 

 full-grown larva? in June, and one on Sept. 24th, the latter imported 

 from Lisbon, but the others from Spain. Probably the majority of 

 the specimens of the species captured in this country arrive here in 

 the larval state, but it is quite possible that occasionally the insect 

 may pass through the whole of its metamorphoses on British soil. 

 Mr. Golding Bird states (Entom. ix. 261) that in the autumn of 

 1876 he found some larva? on the flower-heads of scarlet geranium in 

 the Isle of Wight. They were very numerous, and varied greatly in 

 colour, but as he did not know to what species they belonged, and 

 thinking that they would produce some common moth, he only 

 secured about half a dozen. These were injured in the journey to 

 London, and he reared but one imago on August 1st. 



In the United States, where it is known as " Cotton-boll worm," 

 " Corn-ear worm,'' and " Tomato-fruit worm," II. armigera has the repu- 

 tation of being destructive to the cotton crop, the estimated damage 

 ranging in the different States from two to something like fifteen per cent. 

 Probably, however, it is more injurious to corn, as there are five genera- 

 tions in the year, and the first three of these occur in cornfields more 

 especially. Besides corn, cotton, and tomato, the larva affects beans, 

 tobacco, pumpkins, melons, garden flowering plants, and also various 

 wild plants. The species has been the object of special investigation by 



