the Vhalcena ti/pkoides, 405 



intruders took place ; and my astonishment was not a little 

 increased on finding, as they collected in accumulated bodies 

 round the lamp, with not more than two or three exceptions, 

 the mass consisted of these hitherto unobserved Phalae^nae typi- 

 coMes. Soon after ten o'clock, when the shower had subsided, 

 the assemblage diminished, and at length my visiters altoge- 

 ther retired ; and from that hour to this I have never again 

 observed a single specimen. 



Granting that the peculiar circumstances of the rain or 

 electrical state of the air may have driven them to the light 

 of the window and lamp, I cannot but think, if they had 

 been tolerably plentiful either in previous or subsequent 

 years, I must have detected a few stray individuals ; and I 

 can only account for the inundation on this evening by ex- 

 traordinary broods having been bred in the neighbourhood, 

 or that this vast flight was performing an act of itinerancy, 

 during which it was overtaken by the shower, and compelled 

 to seek protection under the closing shelter of the trellis- 

 work. To this latter opinion I feel the more inclined to 

 accede, from the circumstance that, with the exception of the 

 small nettle (C/rtica urens), the other plants on which the 

 larvae are said to feed, viz. white mullein (Ferbascum Lych- 

 nitis), motherwort (Leoniirus Cardiaea), hound' s-tongue (Cy- 

 noglossum officinale), bay-leaved willow (5alix pentandra), 

 are some of them rather scarce, and none of them certainly 

 plentiful in the vicinity; and the authorities for the occa- 

 sional migration of insects, of the various orders Coleoptera, 

 Lepidoptera, Hemiptera, &c., are too strong and too nume- 

 rous to admit of doubt as to the fact. Thus, Mr. Mar- 

 sham mentions the case of a lady's dress being covered with 

 Cicadae bifasciatae*, a small hemipterous insect by no means 

 common; when, on the following day, the same steps being taken 

 to procure some, not a single one could be found. The same 

 circumstance was noticed by a friend of his a few years 

 afterwards ; and it was their opinion that the insects in ques- 

 tion were migrating. A similar occurrence relating to a 

 family of the same order, viz. Cicada spumaria, or froth 

 froghopper, is alluded to by Mr. Kirby on the authority of 

 Professor Walch, whose case in some degree resembles mine. 

 He says, that one night about eleven o'clock, sitting in his 

 study, his attention was attracted by what seemed the pelting 

 of hail against his window ; which surprising him by its long 

 continuance, he opened the window, and found the noise to 

 proceed from a flight of these little froghoppers, which en- 

 tered the room in such numbers as to cover the table. On a 



* See Donov.pl. 387. 



