﻿Collecting in wales. 383 



evening was a damp one ; but we turned out, and netted Cabera 

 pusaria, M. margaritaria, Thyatira batis, Hydroscia nictitans, 

 Agrotls exclamationis, Bromolocha fontis (crassalis), and Hypena 

 proboscidalis. At sugar we had poor luck, meeting only our old 

 friends Xylophasia monoglypha (polyodon), T. pronuba, A. excla- 

 mationis, T. batis, and Cidaria truncata (russata). I boxed a 

 female glow-worm, Lampyris noctiluca, as it brilliantly lit up an 

 inch of grass in the wood. 



July 17th. — A fine, warm, but sunless day. Mr. Kerr and I 

 drove to Penrhyndeudraeth, a distance of eight miles. The 

 nearest approach I can make to this formidable word is Pen-rin- 

 dy-dreth. Like other Welsh names it is singularly descriptive, 

 and means the headland between the two estuaries. There we 

 started by train for a week's collecting at Aberdovey, a little town 

 of a thousand inhabitants, half-way along the shores of Cardigan 

 Bay, and, as the name implies, at the mouth of the Dovey. 

 Parallel with the north shore of the estuary, and running away 

 east and behind the town, is a range of heights some 300 feet 

 above the sea-level. In the neighbourhood of the town these 

 hills are covered with grass, furze, and fern, and are said to be a 

 locality for Lyccena avion. As the heights run inland they are 

 covered with a luxuriant growth of native oak, and midway 

 between Aberdovey and Glandovey Junction they descend, within 

 a few hundred yards of the estuary, in woody valleys meeting 

 round a common centre. Here lies some of the finest scenery 

 imaginable, and here lay our best butterfly ground. We reached 

 Aberdovey, via Barmouth, at noon, and operations began at once 

 by the discovery of Dianthoecia larvae in the seed-pods of bladder . 

 campion growing about the railway-station. These caterpillars 

 we made out to be D. carpophaga and D. capsophila. They 

 pupated after I returned to Chester, before the end of the month. 

 After lunch at the Dovey Hotel we turned out to secure quarters, 

 and noticed on our way specimens of Bryophila perla at rest upon 

 the walls. Our first attempt at securing lodgings was a failure, 

 owing to the landlady taking alarm at our demand to be out at 

 all hours of the night. This, coupled with a statement that our 

 business was " moths," brought upon us expulsion. However, 

 at No. 1, Bodfor Terrace, we triumphed in the surrender of a 

 latch-key, and there we spent as happy, as homely, and as com- 

 fortable a week as could fall to the lot of humanity. The list 

 for the afternoon is as follows: — Larvse of Bombyx rubi; C. 

 umbratica at rest ; by beating brambles, St. John's wort, &c, 

 Hemithea strigata (thymiaria), Emmelesia decolorata, Eupithecia 

 subfulvata var. oxydata, E. linariata, E. exiguata, E. pumilata 

 (plentiful), Mimceseophilus plagiodactylus, M. ocellata, Acidalia 

 bisetata, A. marginepunctata (promutata) , Cidaria pyraliata, 

 Pelurga comitata, and Scoparia mercwialis. 



A bottle of rum, a lantern, a treacle-pot and a blacking brush 



