228 REV. F. A. WALKER, D.D., F.L.S., ETC., 
there is a fortnightly difference of species according to the 
season of the year is, on the other hand, very evident, bat 
the experience of Mr. Steincke as a resident (livmg during 
the summer at Akureyri, and in the winter at Copenhagen) 
would not appear to exceed my own as regards the number 
of Coleoptera, when he informed me that there were a great 
number of beetles to be found in the N. of Iceland in May, 
but only ten species. My friend Dr. Mason’s experience is 
also confirmatory of this statement, as he remarked on the 
immense number of individuals in proportion to the paucity 
of species. Staudinger narrates that most of the species of 
Coleoptera he found under stones, in turf, all the Staphy- 
linidee in dung, or under dead birds. I captured nearly all 
my Coleoptera under stones, generally on the ground, occa- 
sionally, as at Flatey Island, under stones on the top of a 
low wall surrounding the homestead—the only beetles that 
I took on the wing being Creophilus maxillosus in a lane 
bordered by stone walls in the outskirts of Reykjavik, and a 
specimen of Byrrhus on the slopes above Eskefjord—of 
which genus Staudinger mentions two species, Byrrhus 
pilula and fasciatus. To consider 2 or 3 of Olassen’s and 
Povelsen’s 6 species of Coleoptera in detail: their Latin 
descriptions commence with Coleoptera, and are continued 
successively by 1 species of Hemiptera, 4 of Lepidoptera 
Heterocera, counting a Phrygania as one of the moths in 
question, 8 Hymenoptera, and about 11,as far as I can make out, 
of Diptera. Itis highly interesting to find a weevil recorded 
in 1772 as “ Curculio abdomine ovato, niger coleoptris striato- 
granulatis,’ because this is probably the commonest beetle in 
all Iceland, and I collected specimens of it accordingly from 
Reykjavik in the 8.W., Stykkisholm, Flatey Island, Arna- 
fjord, Onundafjord, Isatjord on the W. coast, and Reyka- 
fjord and Saudarkrok on the N. _ It is interesting to be able 
to adduce an instance of the continuity, if I may so phrase 
it, of the entomology of the country since 1772, because in 
other respects the island has undergone great changes since 
that period. For example, these same authors, Olassen and 
Povelsen, on their journey through Iceland, mention wheat 
crowing in the southern districts, and Captain Burton records 
in connection with this fact that the cause of the change, 
sometimes attributed to oscillations of temperature, is simply 
disforesting, which has promoted the growth of bog and 
heath now covering half the island, which allows storm 
winds to sweep unopposed over the surface, and which, 
since the Saga times, has necessarily rendered the cold less 
