OF AN INSECT HUNTER. 313 



greenhorn he considered me. Leaving the room for a few 

 minutes, he returned with two large folding-boxes filled with 

 Geometrites, Noctuites, and a row of Colias Electra; or, as 

 he termed them, slender-bodies , full-bodies, and clouded 

 yelloivs. The whole were for sale, at prices proportionate to 

 their rarity, on which subject I felt myself worldly ignorant. 

 I made a few trifling purchases, and we became excellent 

 friends. 



This brother of the net, I found, had been staying some 

 weeks in the neighbourhood, making Birch Wood Corner his 

 head-quarters, and occasionally spending a day or two in 

 some other favourite woods in the neighbourhood. On the 

 morning in question he was going to Darenth Wood, or 

 rather Darn, that being the name by which he designated it, and 

 by which it is usually known. I immediately volunteered 

 myself as a companion, and my offer was accepted. Long 

 preparation was not needed by either of us, and within half an 

 hour we were marching side by side. The lane, from Birch to 

 Darenth, turns out of the Maidstone road to the left, imme- 

 diately beyond the premises of the Bull. About a mile from 

 Birch, my companion showed me the spot where he had taken 

 five specimens of the beautiful Issoria Lathonia, or Queen of 

 Spain. He found them settling on flowers in the hedges, by 

 the way-side. As we proceeded, I was asked a variety of 

 questions, intended to elicit my name and rank in the entomo- 

 logical world. My companion was well acquainted with the 

 leading entomologists, and spoke of them as intimates, relating 

 a variety of transactions which he had had with each. We de- 

 scended into a most romantic chalk-pit, to the right of the lane, 

 in which is a cave of considerable extent, with a roof finely 

 arched. In the pit was a fine old plant of Atropa bella- 

 donna, then magnificently in blossom. In this place I quite 

 exhausted the polite patience of my companion, by my long 

 examination of a colony of AnthopJwra retusa. This bee is 

 said to build a kind of mud hive, or nest, against the trunk of 

 a tree, a bank, or wall ; but in the present instance, and many 

 others which I have since examined, there was no external 

 building whatever, the bees entering the face of the bank by 

 perfectly round smooth holes. Another kind of bee, Melecta, was 

 continually arriving with the Anthophorce, and entering their 

 holes; it appeared to be on a perfectly friendly footing with the 



