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CAPTURE OF NOCTURNAL LEPIDOPTERA. 



this opinion, and prepared ourselves with such lanterns as we 

 could procure ; the result was the capture of several species 

 in the very act of feasting on the saccharine juices of the fruit. 

 Having previously arranged to leave Mickleham the day after, 

 we regretted we could not then examine further, what appeared 

 to us, a novelty to entomologists. On our return to London, 

 we prepared ourselves with three bull's-eye lanterns, forceps, &c. 

 and determined to visit the yew-trees. On the nights of the 

 24th, 26th, and 27th of September, we captured the following 

 moths — all as perfect and beautiful as bred specimens— except 

 Orthosia lunosa, which was faded, and evidently going off: — 



The following autumn (1832) I examined the same trees 

 every other night, from the middle of September until the ninth 

 of October, without seeing a single moth. The weather, about 

 the latter end of September and the beginning of October, was 

 cold, and very rainy, the wind high, and the yew-tree berries 

 were not generally ripe, which indicated a late season. On the 

 evening of the 10th the moths began to appear; and I continued 

 my nocturnal visitations every night until the 16th, and after- 

 wards three nights a-week, until the 5th of November. I cap- 

 tured the following seven species, which I had not seen the first 

 year, and all the other species enumerated in the preceding list, 

 except Agrotis nigricans, Orthosia lunosa, Xylina semibrun- 

 nea, Xanthiajlavago, X. fulvago, X. citrago, and X. rujina — 



