292 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
recommended by some: I have tried this, and found it useless 
by itself. Others recommend essence of almonds, about 
which I cannot pronounce. So uncertain a thing is sugaring 
for moths, even in the most likely localities, that the beginner 
at it must not be surprised if several successive nights turn 
out to be failures. And what tends to make the matter more 
provoking is, that the nights you might select as apparently 
suitable as regards temperature, moisture and so forth, will 
not prove to be so. Windy weather is, of course, bad; 
moonlight nights frequently so, but not always. Most success 
will attend sugaring for moths if it is done continuously. In 
the yeats 1865 and 1866 I tried this mode of trapping moths 
in a garden at Chelsea, on an average about every other 
night, from May to September. I regret now that I did not 
tabulate the results at the time, but, from memory, I should 
say that upon about half the nights there was “ no meeting,’ 
and the nights when there was a levee did not occur oftener 
than once a week. It was hardly likely, so near London, that 
anything very special would turn up, though there were some 
species which must, I presume, have flown a considerable 
distance. Geometre rarely appeared; and hardly a Pyrale, 
except P. fimbrialis. A notable proof of how London is 
spreading westward is furnished by the fact that now, after 
five years only have elapsed, sugaring is of little advantage, 
only such species as Acronycta Psi, Mamestra Brassice and 
Mania typica generally appearing.—J. R. S. Clifford; 
Chelsea. 
Parasitic Acari on Cage Birds.—\ find that these attack 
not only canaries, but also goldfinches and linnets. It was 
pointed out to me by a bird-fancier, that a frequent source of 
these is the bird-seed ; and upon examination I have several 
times found them about in rape and hemp, as supplied from 
the shops; not in canary. ‘To all appearance they devour 
the seed; if so, it may be assumed, perhaps, that they 
transfer themselves to the birds rather for the sake of the 
shelter their plumage affords than for the purpose of attacking 
them. No doubt there are species which do so; and I am 
inclined to think that they do migrate from the bird to the 
human subject, and vice versd, from this circumstance, that 
when absent from home on one occasion my house was left 
in charge of a person suffering (as was afterwards discovered) 
