63 
ENTOMOLOGICAL INTELLIGENCE, NOTICES OF 
NEW WORKS, &c. 
(No. IV.) 
INFORMATION RESPECTING THE HABITS OF EXOTIC INSECTS.—It so rarely 
occurs that the entomologist is able to obtain any satisfactory re- 
marks on the habits of exotic insects from travellers competent from 
their knowledge of entomology, combined with enlarged views on 
the general laws of nature, that I presume no apology is needed in 
offering to the student, from time to time, extracts from the works 
of authors whose acquirements stamp a sterling value upon their 
observations. The writings of Burchell, Darwin, Gosse, and 
Doubleday, especially merit attentive perusal on this account. The 
journal and remarks during the years 1832—1836, made by Charles 
Darwin, Esq., M.A., Sec. Geol. Soc., published as the 3rd Volume 
of the “‘ Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty’s Ships 
Adventure and Beagle,” afford numerous passages relative to insects 
from which the following is extracted. 
“ At Port San Julian, in Patagonia, although we could nowhere 
find, during our whole visit, a single drop of fresh water, yet some 
must exist, for by odd chance I found on the surface of the sea- 
water, near the head of the bay, a Colymbetes, not quite dead, 
which, in all probability, had lived in some not far distant pool. 
Three other kinds of insects—a Cincindela-like hybrida, Cymindis 
and a Harpalus, which all live on muddy flats, occasionally over- 
flowed by the sea—and one other beetle, found dead on the plain, 
complete the list of Coleoptera. A good-sized fly (Tabanus) was 
extremely numerous, and tormented us by its painful bite. We 
have here the puzzle that so frequently occurs in the case of 
mosquitoes—On the blood of what animals do these insects com- 
monly feed? The guanaco is nearly the only warm-blooded 
quadruped, and they are present in numbers quite inconsiderable 
compared to the multitude of flies,” p. 200. 
It is a curious circumstance in the economy of nature that the 
gnat and mosquito are also found in the greatest profusion in 
damp situations, where they can find but few opportunities of 
indulging their blood-thirsty propensities (see Introd. to Modern. 
Class. of Ins. vol. ii. p. 511). The comparatively rare occurrence 
