334 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. 



it does in spring from stumps of the trees felled during win- 

 ter. This showed, what I was not previously aware of, that 

 there is an ascent of sap in autumn as well as in spring. 

 The weather was very similar to that considered favourable 

 to the flowing of the sap in spring, slight frosts at night and 

 pleasant warm days. But I was going to allude to another 

 curious circumstance : this stump was thronged day after 

 day by great numbers of insects, busily engaged in sucking 

 the saccharine juices which exuded. Besides beetles, bugs, 

 ichneumons, and multitudes of flies, of various kinds, there 

 were many Noctuce and butterflies (chiefly of the Camber- 

 well Beauty and Violet-tip species j the former of which was 

 quite numerous). 



jp. I observed the larvae of the firefly shining in the 

 grass as late as the evening of the 22nd of October. It may 

 be possible we have more than one luminous species ofLam- 

 pyris : this is a subject worth some examination. Perhaps, 

 what I have supposed to be larvae, may be an apterous spe- 

 cies, allied to the glow-worm of Europe. Mr. Knapp, in his 

 Journal of a Naturalist, mentions the appearance of the 

 glow-worm about the end of September, as unusually late ; 

 and that in the mild climate of England. It is true our 

 brief return of summery weather may have re-vivified these 

 beetles, so far as to induce them to emerge from their hyber- 

 nacula, as well as the butterflies and dragonflies, which have 

 lately appeared: the last, especially, seem as exclusively 

 summer insects as the fireflies. 



C. I observed a winged Aphis in the house a few days 

 ago : and the crinking of the Grylli has not yet ceased, for I 

 have heard it at intervals, since we have been abroad to-day. 

 I have within a few days met with several groups of a very 

 beautiful little Carabus (Agonum Cupripenne) ; at first 

 sight you would hardly know it from the polished brown 

 sort that runs so swiftly among gardens, which, from their 



