70 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [March '05 



family, grew all about me. This proved to be the food-plant 

 of a tropical Lejna, the confusa of Chevrolot, a pretty orange 

 and black beetle, and I gathered many specimens. Deer flies — 

 Chrysops Jlavida — buzzed about my head, shining golden-green 

 Dolichopids alighted on the leaves near by, and one morning a 

 gorgeous fly of metallic blue came to my very hand, allowing 

 me to capture it and learn that it was Microdon scitulus Will. 

 Even lycpidoptera sought out my log, rare species too. One 

 hot noon as I sat resting there before starting homeward I saw 

 an oddly shaped object of silvery white, touched with black, 

 on the smooth red bark at my side. Bending to examine it I 

 found it was a small moth with folded wings and placed a 

 cyanide bottle — quickly emptied for the purpose — over it. It 

 was a fine fresh specimen of Mieza igninix, the pretty moth of 

 Yponomeutidse, whose curious larva I was so fortunate as to 

 discover at Punta Gorda years ago (Jour. N. Y. Ent. Soc. , 

 Vol. IV, p. 86.) A small tree, the red bay — Persea catesby- 

 ana — grew just within reach of my hand as I sat there and one 

 day I pulled some of the aromatic leaves to rub between my 

 fingers while I sniffed the spicy odor. As I did so a larva 

 dropped into my lap, an odd looking thing, with forward por- 

 tion near the head swollen and enlarged. Searching I found 

 several others and carried them home. They fed well, pupa- 

 ted, and in early April became moths of the species Bro7ichelia 

 hortaria, a handsome Geometer. 



Hymenoptera also, Hemiptera, Odonata, Orthoptera all, at 

 one time or another, visited me at my log cabin and met with a 

 warm soothing welcome there. That singular little Gryllid 

 or cricket, Mogosiplistus slossonce, ran swiftly away as I lifted 

 the bark under which it lay hid, spiders crawled off from dark 

 corners, hundreds of mites crowded thickly together there, and 

 ants of two or three species seemed to have their abode in wood 

 or bark. 



Among the mites were some small roundish black creatures 

 which I at first took to be also Acarina. But on examination 

 they proved to be beetles, and Mr. Blanchard identified them 

 as Acritus atomus I/CC. , a Cuban species, not previously recog- 

 nized in our fauna. 



