266 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
science, he would possibly throw considerable light on this 
matter, and enable us to arrive at some more definite knowledge 
of the natural laws which govern insect-life than we appear to 
possess at present. Before leaving this subject I may refer to 
an occurrence with which most collectors are doubtless acquainted, 
viz., the great activity displayed by insects when a thunderstorm 
is Impending ; and again, how often it happens, after a heavy 
thunderstorm, that insects become suddenly scarce. 
Having thus briefly given expression to my views concerning 
the scarcity of Lepidoptera, I will proceed to jot down a few 
notes of my entomological captures and observations during the 
past season. Towards the end of April and during May I found 
larvee exceedingly abundant in every hedgerow about Kingsbury, 
Harrow, and Mill Hill, in Middlesex. These were chiefly Nola 
cucullatella, Hybernia rupicapraria, some common Micros, such 
as Teras contaminana and Sciaphila nubilana, with a sprinkling 
of Dictyopteryx holmiana, Penthina ochroleucana, and Sideria 
achatana. On herbage growing in ditches, on banks, or waste 
places, a goodly number of Chelonia caja larve were to be 
obtained. I collected a number of these and fed them up on 
coltsfoot and lettuce, putting some under various coloured glass, 
others in complete darkness, and in fact. employing all the 
artifice I thought likely to assist in causing some variation in the 
future imagines, but I need hardly say that I was not success- 
ful in obtaining a single aberrant form of C. caja from these 
larve. On the other hand, from some pup sent me from Scot- 
land, which had been fed up in the open, I got one example 
which differed from the type in having the basal half of the 
left-superior wing of the usual cream-colour, but with the 
chocolate markings only indicated on the inner margin at the 
base and towards the costa. This specimen is deformed ; one or 
two of the other specimens are very dark, the chocolate pigment 
predominating to a considerable extent. 
Imagines of Coccyx splendidulana were abundant near 
Hendon, and, as the circumstances attending the capture of 
this species were new to me, I venture to give an account in 
detail. I should state, in the first place, that in previous years I 
had only met with single examples of this species, either at rest 
on the trunks or beaten from the boughs of oak trees; but at 
Hendon this year the insect must have been in hundreds among 
