OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES. 409 



season they leave their aurelia, and issue forth in their fly- state, 

 swarming and covering the trees and hedges. 



In a field at Greatham I saw a flight of swifts busied in catching 

 their prey near the ground, and found they were hawking after 

 these PhalcBncB. The aurelice of this moth is shining and as black 

 as jet, and lies wrapped up in a leaf of the tree, which is rolled 

 round it, and secured at the ends by a web, to prevent the maggot 

 from falling out. WHITE. 



I suspect that the insect here meant is not the Phalana quercus, 

 but the Phalczna viridataf concerning which I find the following 

 note in my " Naturalist's Calendar " for the year 1785. 



About this time, and for a few days last past, I observed 'the 

 leaves of almost all the oak-trees in Denn copse to be eaten and 

 destroyed, and, on examining more narrowly, saw an infinite 

 number of small beautiful pale-green moths flying about the trees ; 

 the leaves of which that were not quite destroyed were curled up, 

 and withinside were the exuviae or remains of the chrysalis, from 

 whence I suppose the moths had issued, and whose caterpillar had 

 eaten the leaves. MARKWICK. 



EPHEMERA CAUDA B I SETA. MAY-FLY. 



June 10, 1771. Myriads of May-flies appear for the first time on 

 the Alresford stream. The air was crowded with them, and the 

 surface of the water covered. Large trouts sucked them in as they 

 lay struggling on the surface of the stream, unable to rise till 

 their wings were dried. 



This appearance reconciled me in some measure to the wonderful 

 account that Scopoli gives of the quantities emerging from the rivers 



* If this was the Ph. (tortrix) viridana, as suggested by Mr. Markwick, they are 

 extremely destructive, and not confined to the south. In some parts of Argyleshire we 

 recollect seeing many hundred acres of oak woods stripped of their leaves, and as bare as 

 in early spring. The colour of the true T. viridana, however, is green, not yellow, as Mr. 

 White states, and his moth may have been another species. 



