246 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



were on the wing, but A. gilvaria and E. ochroleuca were only 

 just appearing. 



Mr. Tarbat having to leave us, Mr. Whittingham and I next 

 journeyed to the Norfolk coast. Our first object of ambition was 

 Crambusfascelinellus, which I had found fairly plentiful two years 

 ago. In the distressingly cold atmosphere not a specimen could 

 be induced to fly in the daytime, and not more than two or three 

 were found at rest in the sandpits. Our hopes were accord- 

 ingly fixed on what could be done at night, and at first they 

 seemed doomed to be disappointed. Careful searching, however, 

 revealed the fact that C. fascelinelkis was about. It was found 

 sitting, like C. contaminellus, an inch or two above the ground, but 

 only on the spots, at the back of the sandhills, where a few 

 scattered blades of grass struggled up through the sand. It 

 seldom sat on the marram or on other grasses where these 

 latter grew thickly, the surface of the sand had to be well in 

 evidence, and in such spots we took a fine series. There was a 

 very short and partial flight at dusk, which would probably have 

 been larger and more general in warmer weather, and the 

 insect again flew after ten o'clock. 



The best part of a day, spent in water up to our knees and 

 with frequent storms beating down upon our heads, produced 

 two dozen larvae or pupse of N. canna, and they were well earned. 



Finding that C. fascelinellus was beginning to get wasted we 

 next directed our attention to C. alpinelliis, which Mr. Whitting- 

 ham had turned up two years previously. Our experience was 

 most interesting. Still dogged by hostile elements our expecta- 

 tions were not great, and when, at our first essay, ten o'clock 

 struck without a sign of the Crambid we began to despair. It 

 was bitterly cold, but we knew that it must be hiding some- 

 where. Then the happy thought struck us of placing our 

 lamps on the ground, shining straight into the tangled roots 

 of the marram. Almost instantly a little moth began jumping 

 out towards the light, and then another, and our pleasure was 

 great when we found that alphiellus had been moved at last. 

 Later on the weather improved, and with it the tale of our 

 captures of this species. On a fine afternoon there is a very 

 general flight between six and seven o'clock, the Crambid being 

 then not only on the wing on its own account, but also easily 

 induced to fly by tapping the fir trees where it evidently shelters 

 as frequently as in the marram. On one such afternoon we 

 must have captured fully seventy specimens in an hour and a 

 half. The delicate fringes of the hind wings soon get worn, but 

 many of the captures were freshly emerged and in splendid order. 



One other insect seems worthy of note. This is the recently 

 discovered Retinia purdeyi, which flew round the branches of the 

 Austrian pines (at least such we took the trees to be) in the 

 late afternoon. Difiicult to capture in a wind, it occurred in 



