270 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



181. Captures on the Birch-Wood Bai/. — The 5lb of 

 July, 1865, at Birch Wood, in the county of Kent, was a 

 glorious English summer day ; it was a day never to be for- 

 gotten by those entomological brethren who there and then 

 assembled to commemorate the establishment of the Ento- 

 mological Club. This meeting is annual ; the day is spent 

 in entomological rambles in the neighbourhood, and a social 

 gathering at dinner takes place in the evening, when the 

 labours of the day are over: such is the programme of this 

 annual festival. There is one question which not only every 

 member of the Club, but also every one who has fortunately 

 been a guest, is continually putting to his brother Entonio- 

 logists, " Have you ever dined at the Birch- Wood Dinner?" 

 If you have never enjoyed one of these annual gatherings, 

 you have yet to learn how kindly, how sociable, how- 

 brotherly Entomologists really are ; as a principle I take it 

 all real naturalists nujst be so, but on these occasions this 

 amiable sociability is so thoroughly pervading. Let me, then, 

 mark this 5th of July, 1865, as an entomological " red-letter 

 day," for on that day I saw alive, for the first time, that 

 lovely Hymenoplerous insect, Hedychrum lucidulum ; I cap- 

 tured twenty-five specimens ; they were prying about a bank 

 in which tlie burrows of Halicli were very numerous, for 

 upon these bees M. Wesmael tells us they are parasitic. 

 Mr. Rye took a single example of H. lucidulum last year, 

 but 1 do not recollect where. The second rarily that fell in 

 my way was the very local bee, Sphecodes subquadratus : 

 this species was in tolerable abundance, and both sexes in 

 about equal numbers : I had not seen this insect alive 

 during the last fifteen years. The last rarity I have to record 

 the capture of is the little Cerceris quinquefasciata, the C. 

 interrupta of Shuckard's ' Monograph of the Fossorial Hy- 

 menoplera :' the only other localities for this species with 

 which 1 am acquainted are Southend and Lowestoft : this 

 insect provisions its nest with species of Curculionidae, se- 

 lecting Apion rufirostre, A. Malvjje and A. a^neum, all of 

 which it finds on the common mallow. — Frederick Suiith ; 

 British Museurii, July 15, 1865. 



182. Turner's Coleopterous Captures: a neiv Atiobium. — 

 My friend Mr. Harper and myself have received from Charles 

 Turner some notable Scotch rarities, including Dendrophagus 



