216 THE ENTOMOLOGIST S EECORD. 



together aboiit an hour, after which ^S'. ocellatus started layhig, and in 

 five days laid 56 eggs. These eggs are different in colour and shape 

 from those laid by S. popuU, being a light pale green tinged with 

 pinkish and more elongated. On June 14th some of the ova were slightly 

 depressed. (3) On May 29th I bred a male S)neyintln(s ocellatus ; it 

 began to fly about (as if in search for a mate) so I placed a female S. 

 tiliae (bred the same afternoon) with it and both flew about the cage 

 furiously, but the ,S'.or('Z/fl?//.s darted at once on the S. tiliae and they were 

 paired for half an hour when S. tiliae began struggling and they parted. 

 I left them in the cage for five days, but still the ? S. tiliae laid no 

 eggs. I then killed the S. ocellatus, and later, on the same evening, 

 the ? ;S'. tiliae laid one egg. From June 3rd till June 14th eight 

 eggs were laid, all on the underside of lime leaves. I hope these will 

 hatch, especially as I have never heard of these two species pairing 

 before. I will report later as to the results. — C. P. Pickett, The 

 Kavenscrofts, Columbia Eoad, Hackney Eoad, London, N.E. June 

 Uth, 1900. 



Habits of certain Erebias.^ — "SVe have already described {Proc. Sth. 

 Lond. Ent. Soc, 1898, pp. 64-5) the great difference that exists in the 

 habits of the sexes of Krehia nerine. This would appear to be pretty 

 general among many Erebiid species. On August 3rd, 1899, a walk 

 up the road from Simplon to the first refuge showed a number of 

 males of Erehia vmcstra settling on the bare road, and with them 

 swarms of Erehia goantc, E. jntJio and E. tyndarus. Not a single 

 female E. mnestra came to the road that we could discover, and the 

 females of the three commoner species named, also insisted on keeping 

 to the flowers of the slopes and roadsides, and rarely followed the 

 habits of the other sex. The males will often sit three or four (or 

 more) in a little heap, heads together, reminding one much of the 

 gregarious habits of those of E. iicrinc on the rocks of the Mendelstrasse. 

 I)r. Chapman observed a pairing between the sexes of E. e/oante. The 

 male was seen to walk up to the female two or three times, without 

 appearing to make 'much progress, when suddenly and witliout any 

 apparent further courtship the insects suddenly paired. If E. iicante 

 be disturbed when paired, the male ahvays appears most anxious to 

 get away, and hurries oft' as rapidly as possible, carrying the female. — 



J. W. TUTT. 



Moths attracted by, and drowned in, the drainings from a 

 MANURE HEAP. — Oil August 2nd, 1899, Dr. Chapman and myself took 

 a walk to the pastures stretching to the right hand, about a mile or 

 two from the village of Simplon, going towards the summit of the 

 pass. These slopes form a remarkably good collecting ground, and on 

 this particular day we saw Colias ijhicomono and C. hyalc haunting the 

 same ground. The abundance of Si/richtJms alveiis here is almost 

 incredible, the 2 s distinctly sprinkled with yellow, and the males 

 flying early in search of the newly emerged ? s, which hide among 

 the grass, whilst PoZ7/oH?)»fl?Hs cor^rfon is nearly as abundant. Brenihis 

 pales is common, this species extending quite down to the village. The 

 common Erebias are mclampus, ti/itdarus, pitJio and goante, whilst E. 

 eun/ale is comparatively rare. I may here note that of three females 

 of this latter species captured, not one was like the others, and one of them, 

 although evidently a female, presents none of the characters of the under- 

 side that distinguish the latter sex, but is exactly similar in this 



