290 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



my friends, Eev. J. W. Metcalfe and Kev. J. E. Tarbat, proposed 

 a joint expedition, the opportunity for putting one's idea into 

 practice presented itself. Accordingly we engaged a twelve-ton 

 yacht, and on July 29th I arrived at Potter Heigham on a most 

 uninviting da,y, after a journey from Leicester, during which it 

 had rained hard the whole time. My friends, who had already 

 spent a week on the coast, where "Mr. Metcalfe had made the 

 interesting discoveries of Lithosia pygmceola and Crambus fasceli- 

 nellus he has already recorded, had established themselves on 

 the boat and laid in stores. They described the consternation 

 of the skipper when they arrived with their luggage, and his 

 dismay when they told him the man who was coming would have 

 much more. Our first proceeding was to go through a process 

 of unpacking and sorting and stowing of necessaries into lockers ; 

 portmanteaux and bags and whatever could be dispensed with 

 being despatched by carrier to Wroxham, where we expected our 

 expedition to end. Even thus the spare bunk (there were four) 

 was loaded with setting-boxes, lamps, and other paraphernalia, 

 and we felt it was not altogether a matter for regret that a 

 fourth member had not been persuaded to join our party. The 

 boat was, however, well equipped with many ingenious contri- 

 vances, and answered our purpose admirably ; and, as for the 

 skipper, we could not have had- one more pleasant and reliable, 

 whose interest in our proceedings was genuine and increasing, 

 although there was a smile in the background, especially in the 

 presence of his mates ; and if he did his best to make sailors of 

 us, he, for his part, was ready to learn something about moths. 

 As soon as we were settled we took stock of the wind, and 

 decided that it would be wise to go first up the Thurne to the 

 purlieus of Hickhng Broad and Horsey Mere. We lay up a 

 little before dusk in a promising spot, and after supper set out 

 with our hand-lamps. The evening was still though cold, and a 

 certain amount of cloud gave hopes of a propitious start, but as 

 the night came on the clouds dispersed and banks of white mist 

 lay here and there. It was the kind of evening when nothing 

 would ily, and searching at first only revealed a Scoparia pallida 

 or two and Crambus culmellus, though a few Leucania straminea 

 and Calamia phragmitidis were netted. The marshes were 

 horribly wet, two or three inches of water everywhere, though 

 later experience led us to regard that as comparatively dry 

 ground. Mr. Metcalfe, who has intuitions of the right thing to 

 do, had his attention attracted to a number of heaps of cut 

 rushes that had evidently lain for a few weeks and had not been 

 carried, and he soon shouted that here, creeping out of the heaps, 

 was Nonagria neurica {arundineta). We all set to work searching 

 the heaps, and after a couple of hours we had secured between 

 us two or three dozen. Chilo phragmitellus and a single Ap)amea 

 leucostigma were virtually all the other moths we saw. 



