NOTICS AND OBSERVATIONS. 317 



All things considered, the reference to Andrena seems reasonahly 

 assured. 



Hah. — Mioceue rocks at ffiningen {i.e. Wangen), Baden. 



Apis mellifera (L.). 



In the Museum of Cambridge University is a piece of amber 

 from the coast off Yarmouth, containing two specimens of 

 genuine Apis mellifera, side by side. As preserved, the eyes and 

 ocelli are a fine crimson, evidently from the ej'e-pigment, and 

 the face and front are a deep metallic reddish, perhaps from 

 a suffusion of the same substance. The basal nervure can be 

 seen falling far short of the transverso-medial, and the other 

 characters of the venation, legs, &c., agree with the honey-bee. 

 The amber, as the museum records show, was purchased in the 

 rough by Benjamin Burwood from fishermen in or near Great 

 Yarmouth. The bees, and other amber insects from the same 

 source, were crudely figured by A. S. Foord in Trans. Norf. and 

 Norw. Nat. Soc. vol. v. pt. 1 (1890). The other specimens, also 

 now in the Cambridge Museum, include Coleoptera and Diptera, 

 and a cockroach labelled Blatta orientalis, but evidently not that 

 species, and apparently not identical with any living British 

 form. It is well preserved, and should be studied by a specialist 

 in these insects. 



Conwentz has given a full discussion of English amber in 

 * Natural Science,' 1896. Its age has not been precisely ascer- 

 tained, but if the specimen containing honey-bees is authentic, 

 it must be Pliocene at the oldest, and cannot possibly have any- 

 thing to do with the true Baltic amber of Oligocene age. Con- 

 wentz remarks, however, that much of the succinite in shops at 

 Cromer is imported from abroad in order to satisfy the demand 

 of visitors to the seaside, and from the appearance of the piece 

 containing Apis, I cannot help suspecting that it is really copal, 

 and not of English origin at all. Some of the pieces containing 

 beetles seem to be genuine, however, and these should be criti- 

 cally examined. 



University of Colorado, Boulder : 

 September 14th, 1909. 



NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 



Pupation of Xanthorhoe (Melanippe) fluctuata. — It has 

 been stated that the larva of X. fluctuata having made its frail, under- 

 ground cocoon, postpones the pupal change for a rather long time, 

 perhaps even the entire winter. Some larvae of this species that I 

 reared last September-October, in a glass tumbler with a little earth 

 at the bottom, formed their cocoons in the soil but against the glass. 

 This method of construction enabled me to see the larva in its cell, 



