l'J-1 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



them and establish their identity ; hut, as my companion archly 

 observed, when taxed with the discrepancy between his principles 

 and his active conduct with the net, there was no harm in 

 securing a few for the benefit of one's friends ! And certainly, 

 taking the amount of downright hard labour into account, the 

 doctrine of altruism was never better illustrated. 



The locality indicated to us by " Statsentomolog " Schoyen 

 was Disenaaen on the Kongsvinger line of rail, about forty miles 

 N.E. by E. of Christiania, and we were fortunate in meeting with 

 most excellent accommodation at Saeterstoen, three miles away, 

 but in the neighbourhood of which also both embla and jutta were 

 fairly abundant. 



Yorfreija we were unhappily too late, although a friend who 

 preceded us by a week obtained, I believe, the one specimen 

 necessary to establish its existence. Although embla and jutta 

 were considerably to the fore, both here and at Disenaaen, 

 perfect examples were in the proportion of one to three at the 

 outside. Both of them — more especially jutta — have a habit of 

 sitting sideways, with closed wings, on the trunks of small firs, 

 with the ragged bits of whose bark they are easily confounded. 

 I must confess I took fall advantage of this peculiarity, to the 

 great saving of both wind and legs. 



They have an exasperating zigzag method of flight, and after 

 you have pursued one some way he will often suddenly disappear 

 in mid air as if by magic ; then you know what has happened, 

 and by a cautious stalk from behind you may generally sweep 

 him off the tree on which he has settled. 



A. apldrape was also common enough locally, but, until we 

 got accustomed to its hesitating mode and slightly duskier 

 appearance, it was easy to mistake it for A. eaphrosijne. 



In selecting a habitat for these three creatures it is certain 

 that the Creator took no account of the requirements of their 

 puny captor, man. It may be worse in the tropics — it no doubt 

 is — but, for Europe, of all the damp, treacherous, unpleasant 

 soils the entomologist has to negotiate this would be hard to 

 beat. A bog of yielding mosses and juicy peat, in which you 

 flounder a foot deep at every step, and are lucky when the water 

 does not come above the ankle— felled pine trunks and jagged 

 branches lying prostrate in every direction, and tripping you up 

 in the chase more frecpaently than you care to be reminded of— 

 lovely grey patches of reindeer-moss, looking, at a little distance, 

 beneath the flickering shade of scraggy firs, for all the world like 

 a cool grey rock inviting a rest, and which if, in an unwary and 

 exhausted moment you yield to the temptation, only lands the 

 nether portion of your person in a bath of slush. Added to this, 

 the thin stems of the ubicmitous fir and birch seem expressly 

 invented to baffle the netsman and help the wary prey. So the 

 task of collecting for friends is not all " cakes and ale." 



