370 ME. T. J. BOLD ON HOMOPTERA. 



70. L. Fieberi, Scott, 1. c. 71. 



New to Britain. A male, taken at Abbey "Wood, by Mr. Scott, 

 in July ; and a female, taken by myself in Gosforth Woods, in 

 October, are the only specimens known. 



EUPTERYX, Curtis. 



71. E. nitidulus, Fab. ; Marshall, Ent. Mon. Mag., III., 247. 

 Three specimens from Middleton Old Wood, near Wooler, 



were taken by Mr. James Hardy. This, according to Flor, is 

 nearly confined to Northern Europe. 



72. E. decempunctatd, Fall. ; Marshall, 1. c. 248. 



Taken rather plentifully in the Wooler district, by Mr. James 

 Hardy. Also a northern species. 



coccidj;. 



Coccus vitis, Linn., Syst. Nat., II., 741, 16. 



Last summer I had brought to my notice a curious departure 

 from the usual habit of this creature. In many hot-houses it 

 infests the vines, often to an injurious extent, and is known to 

 gardeners as the " scale." In this case a colony had taken pos- 

 session of, a gooseberry bush growing in the open air, but in a 

 snug corner near the vinery. A branch of this bush was brought 

 to me and had egg-bundles at short intervals throughout its whole 

 length ; these bundles being silky- white, with the dead female 

 on the top of each, curiously simulated the droppings of birds. 

 Besides these the branch was quite alive with young from the 

 just hatched pink hexapod to the half-grown scale. Is it not 

 very curious that instinct should have led the insect to the plant 

 which is said to produce the greater portion of that delicious 

 exhilarating tipple champagne ? 



Dorthesia characias, Latr., Westw. Intro., Vol. I., frontispiece, 

 fig. 8, $ ; Vol. II., 445, fig. 118, 20, ? (D. cataphracta). 



The female of this curious creature was taken in Cold Martin 

 Moss, Wooler, by Mr. Hardy. I once had a bunch of the culms 



