- 
1870). } 65 
As far as I can ascertain, only four larvee have come to maturity out of two hundred 
hatched last year, the vast majority dying in hybernation, and at the first spring 
moult; it can well be understood, therefore, how dear the satisfaction is won— 
after such loss—of securing this species. 
The eggs were sent to us at the end of August, 1869 ; the larve hatched during 
the first week in September; fed and grew slowly till the winter; hybernated when 
between two and three lines in length; resumed feeding in March or April; and 
attained full growth between the end of May and the middle of July. The food 
has for the most part been Aira precox, but Mr. Hellins has found that cwspitosa 
was eaten as the larva approached maturity. One imago has already emerged 
on July 15th. 
The egg may be called large for the size of the fly, and is nearly globular— 
though somewhat ovate—in shape, and placed on end; the shell is glistening, and 
ribbed, but not deeply, with about thirty longitudinal ribs, and with very shallow 
transverse reticulations ; in colour, pale greenish-yellow ; afterwards, pale pinkish- 
grey, speckled with claret-brown. 
The larva when small has the head large and rounded, is stout forwards, and 
tapers from the middle to the tail; is greyish in colour, with reddish-brown dorsal, 
sub-dorsal, lateral and spiracular lines, the lateral being broader than the rest ; the 
spiracles black with another brown line below them; the skin covered, though not 
very closely, with short, stout, curved, pellucid bristles. 
It hybernates at rather over the length of two lines ; creeping down the blades 
of grass, and hiding in the thickest parts of the tufts. Soon after commencing to 
eat again in spring, the larva assumes somewhat of a greenish tint, but after a 
moult the grey returns again. 
In May one was described which had then assumed the last dress. In length 
it was three-quarters of an inch, stout in proportion, thickest at about the fourth 
segment, the back tapering somewhat in a curve, the belly flattened, with the pro- 
legs placed well under it; the head globular, scarcely narrower than the second 
segment; the anal segment bearing two not very prominent blunt points: each 
segment bearing on the back five transverse ridges, studded with minute raised warts, 
emitting fine short tapering bristles; the head also covered with still more minute 
bristle-bearing warts. The ground colour is pale drab, the warts being pale whitish- 
brown; the dorsal stripe is blackish-brown, most intense on the hinder segments, 
and enclosed by two lines of a paler drab than the ground colour; there is a broad 
sub-dors>| stripe of paler drab, growing narrower as it approaches the anal point, 
edged above with a greenish-brown thread, and below with blackish or brownish 
dashes, that almost form a continuous line, the interruptions occurring at the 
beginning of each segment; below this come two thin pale lines, above the 
lower of which are situated the circular black spiracles, each in a little puffed 
eminence ; this lower line in fact forms a ridge, edged below with an interrupted 
brown line; the belly and legs are of a somewhat warmer tint of the ground colour 
of the back. 
The larva thus described continued to grow till June 4th, when it was seven- 
eighths of an inch lony, and stout in proportion, with its back deeper in colour than 
the sides; and presently after this its colouring grew paler, with a pinkish suffusion 
spread over it, and by June 22nd it had changed to a pupa, unattached, but placed 
in an upright position amongst the grass near the ground. 
