NOTES, CAPTURES, ETC. 167 



BASSUS LiETATORIUS BRED FROM A SyRPHUS COCOON. — Oil the 



3rd June I bred this ichneumon from a Syrphus larva, obtained 

 last October in Oreston quarry, feeding on Aphis jacobcce. By 

 the end of the month it changed to pupa, and remained in that 

 state until the above date. — G. C. Bignell ; Stonehouse. 



The Death-watch and its Sound. — Possibly, as Mr. Mac- <-) 

 millan suggests, what is popularly styled the "death-watch," or 

 tick, is produced by more than one species of beetle or larva. 

 Some years ago I lived in a house where this sound was heard 

 repeatedly, as coming from the panelling of one of the sitting- 

 rooms. It was noticed by myself and others that there were 

 variations: thus at times the taps (if taps they were) came with 

 such regularity that they might easily have been mistaken for the 

 actual ticking of a watch ; then there were also occasional taps, 

 with pauses, — these seemed somewhat louder, but listeners did not 

 agree on this point. No insect was seen, in any stage of life, nor 

 were any apertures discovered in such portions of the woodwork 

 as were open to examination. The theory — for it can be nothing 

 more — has been propounded these recent years that the noise is 

 not made by the beetles as a call or signal to each other, which 

 was the opinion of the older entomologists, but produced by the 

 larva, in order to ascertain how near it is to the external air 

 when it is forming mines or galleries. May it prove ultimately 

 to be the fact that both are vocal, but in a different manner ? I 

 have never quite been able to accept another theory, — that it is 

 by striking its head against the wood that the sound is produced 

 by the beetle. The species credited with this ominous appellation 

 is Anobium striatum or tessellation; presumabh' a similar sound 

 may be emitted by other species of Anobium under certain circum- 

 stances. — J. R. S. Clifford; Gravesend, Kent, June 2, 1884. 



Insects affecting stored Rice. — Mr. Riley, in the 

 ' American Naturalist,' says : — "In a lot of damaged rice from 

 the Chinese Centennial Exhibit, recently submitted to us by the 

 the director of the National Museum, we found the following 

 insects : — Numerous larvae of Tenebrio molitor ; larvae of Tenebrio 

 obscurus, somewhat less numerous than the former; also a few 

 imagines of the same species; numerous larvae, pupae and 

 imagines of Murmiclius ovalis ; several larvae and imagines of 

 Trogosita mauritanica ; numerous dead specimens of Calandra 

 oryzce i a few specimens of Silvanus Surinam ens is ; a few larvab of 



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