86 VARIETIES. 



industry, and have regretted that the public has never received 

 the benefit of them. The Philosophical Magazine is first-rate 

 in its peculiar walk : we have often been delighted and in- 

 structed by its pages ; but among merely entomological readers, 

 its very existence is unknown. 



6. Observations on Lucanus Cervus. — The village of Lee, 

 in Kent, appears to be a favourite habitation of this gigantic 

 species of beetle ; but some seasons seem peculiarly favourable 

 to the production of the insect. On the 14th of June, 1831, 

 I found a single male ; and every day between that period and 

 the 5th of July, I found one or more specimens. The even- 

 ings of the 23d and 24th of June, were those on which they 

 were most numerous : many of them were taken on the wing, 

 but generally crawling upon palings, or on elm and lime trees. 

 The females are later in the time of their appearance than the 

 males ; the first I took was on the 21st of June, and they were 

 not at all numerous until the evening of the 23d : even then 

 they were few, — not more, on the average, than one to three 

 males. The females come out later in the evening, and are 

 more sluggish in their motions than the other sex : it is also 

 worthy of remark, that I never took, or even saw, a female on 

 the wing. 



On the 23d of June, early in the evening, I took two males 

 and one female ; I placed them under a tumbler, and shortly 

 after, both the males began to pay some attention to the 

 female. The larger of the two, however, attacked the other with 

 some spirit, pursuing him round the glass, and occasionally 

 pinching him severely with his mandibles, and actually, with 

 his powerful jaws, lifting him fairly oflfthe table. The smaller 

 male appearing to resign his pretensions, I withdrew him, and 

 the others remained in copula about twenty minutes : but the 

 male did not quit his hold of the female for many hours ; during 

 which period another act of copulation took place. The same 

 evening, I took a small pair in copula ; they remained in that 

 state some hours. Subsequently to this, I have seen several 

 other pairs in a similar situation. 



On the evening of the first of July, I took five males all on 

 the wing about a small extent of paling, on which a female 

 was subsequently discovered. I have little doubt that the 

 males were attracted by the female, which was one of the 



