A FEW REMARKS UPON CERTAIN DIPTEROUS INSECTS. i 
host of the ‘‘ Five Miles from Anywhere,” who has for many 
years been used to the eccentricities of entomologists, and who 
can tell them where to work for many species. Whichever way is 
chosen, it is well to write first to see if a bed can be obtained, for 
the visitor must not expect to find a “ grand hotel” with an 
unlimited number of apartments near Wicken Fen. 
Royal Aquarium, Westminster, July, 1880. 
A FEW REMARKS UPON CERTAIN DIPTEROUS INSECTS. . 
By R. H. Meapx. 
Havine spent a few days towards the latter end of last June 
in Buckinghamshire and the neighbouring parts of Oxfordshire, 
I am induced to make a few remarks upon some interesting 
Dipterons which I noticed in those localities. This order is so 
extensive that I shall confine my observations almost exclusively 
to the members of one family, the Anthomytide, which are very 
interesting, though they have received but little attention. 
The first species to which I shall allude is Ophyra anthraa, 
Men. On a hawthorn hedge by the side of the road, on the out- 
skirts of the town of Buckingham, I found this little blue-black 
fly in immense numbers. Some years ago I noticed it before in 
the same place, but I have never seen it in any other locality, 
though I have looked for it in various parts of England. Nearly 
opposite to the hedge in question, on the other side of the road, 
there is a bone-mill, in which bones are ground up for manure ; 
and I noticed that a very strong putrescent odour emanated from 
it. This smell evidently attracted the flies, for they were most 
numerous on that end of the hedge which was nearest to the mill. 
This peculiar species seemed to have almost exclusive possession 
of the locality, for, with the exception of a very few individuals 
belonging to the larger species of the same genus (Ophyra 
leucostoma, Fall.), I noticed no other flies among them. On 
referring to the accounts given of this species by systematic 
authors I found, in Schiner’s ‘ Fauna Austriaca’ (Diptera), the 
remark that it is of local occurrence, and that he once found it in 
countless numbers (‘fin wahrer Unzahl”) near a dead horse. 
What is the source of attraction? Do the larve feed upon 
RA 
