xix 
of trees. Take common lamp-oil, and expose it in the sun for three or four days, or 
until it acquires a gummy consistency and very disagreeable smell, then with a small 
paint-brush paint around the tree, at about two feet from the ground, a band of the oil 
two inches wide, repeating the operation for three or four successive days. It is said 
that this method will protect the tree for four years at least. Perhaps coal tar might 
be found to answer the same purpose.” 
Mr. Stainton said that he had recently received a communication from M. Milliére 
respecting the injury done to crops of rye in the neighbourhood of St. Etienne; 
Dr. Maurice, of that place, had directed his attention to the subject, but being unable 
to detect the author of the so-called ‘‘ epidemic in the rye,” had applied to M. Milliére. 
Mr. Stainton believed that the injury was caused by the larva of the Micro-Lepi- 
dopterous Ochsenheimeria taurella, which by burrowing in the stem caused the ear to 
wither away. 
Mr. Pascoe said that last year (see ‘ Proceedings, 1865, p. 90) he had read a note 
respecting insects alighting on the snow in high mountain regions, and sinking into it 
from the melting of the snow by the radiation of heat from the insect; in ‘The 
Zoologist’ for the present month, Mr. Albert Miller, in commenting on the above 
communication, quotes from F. von Tschudis ‘ Thierleben der Alpenwelt’ the following 
passage :—“ Winged insects, which are often carried by the wind to the upper snow- 
fields, will sink into these sometimes two feet deep, and it has been observed that these 
_ ereatures settle voluntarily on the ‘firn’ [a particular state of the snow, when its surface 
is held together by thin plates or crystals of ice, is so designated], extending their wings 
' and limbs, and that they rest in this position at their ease without moving, it being 
probable that they enjoy the absorption of the oxygen of the ‘firn. If they are taken 
up and removed tu a stone or a piece of wood, they will at once proceed to the ‘ firn,’ 
' where they extend themselves as if inebriated, and gradually sink in, (seemingly) in 
‘full enjoyment. Dug out of a depth of two feet, they sometimes get lively again very 
‘ quickly ; otherwise, if left to themselves, they soon perish and at once get decomposed, 
and then the sinking in will cease. It has been tried to place dead insects on the 
*firn, when the body was found to swell up to a soft mass, then to shrink very much 
and afterwards to decay; after this the ‘ firn’ closes itself over it, which does not easily 
happen with living insects.” Mr. Miller suggests that the lumps of peat found in 
several of the holes were the sediment of the decayed bodies of the insects, perhaps 
increased in size by dust or fine sand so often carried by heavy gales; and adopts the 
theory that the holes were formed by the radiation of heat from the insects. 
Mr. Pascoe did not, however, believe that radiation alone would account for insects 
sinking to the depth of two feet; he thought that long before they reached such a 
depth they would have exhausted the heat already absorbed, and would be concealed 
from the sun’s rays by the imminent snow, and thus be prevented from absorbing more 
heat. On the Monte Moro the holes were about an inch in depth. 
Prof. Westwood had observed bees which had been tempted out of the hive by 
_early sunshine to fall on the snow; becoming benumbed by the cold, they lay without 
action, and gradually descended, so far at all events as that the whole of the body was 
below the level of the snow. 
Prof. Brayley (who was present as a visitor) criticized von Tschudi’s explanation of 
the reason for the insects settling on the ‘ firn,’ and wished to know whence the oxygen 
