200 Insects. 



insect by means of an iinimpregnated female, we proceeded to White-moss on the 30lh 

 of April last, and after a little time succeeded in finding a female, but it did not at- 

 tract the males until near the close of their flight at 5, P.M. ; still we had sufficient 

 sport to induce us to try again the next afternoon with the same female, and I can as- 

 sure you we were quite satisfied, although a strong easterly wind blew all the time. 

 The males came in abundance, and alighting on or about the box, allowed themselves 

 to be picked off with the fingers, without attempting to escape. By lying down on the 

 moss and looking over the heath, we could perceive the males beating up towards us 

 at a distance of a hundred and fifty yards. Having gratified ourselves, we left for 

 home, and passing through " Boggart-hole clough,'' a wild and romantic valley cele- 

 brated in Roby's ' Traditions of Lancashire,' we stopped some time to see an oak fell- 

 ed, and during the interval I was astonished to see an emperor fly with great swiftness 

 between two trees I had passed under ^ and immediately afterwards alight on the box, 

 covered with gauze and containing the female, which I had carried in my hand all the 

 way from the moss to that place, a distance of not less than a mile and a half, by far 

 the greatest distance I ever heard of a male tracking a female. Some entomologists 

 may think this male had been bred in the clough, but I am not aware of a single spe- 

 cimen, with the above exception, having ever been found away from the moss, where 

 they are very local. We captured Lasiocampa Rubi and Quercus in the same man- 

 ner on the moss; the former insect will come till it is quite dark, and both species fly 

 with greater rapidity than Saturnia Pavonia-minor. — Robert S. Edleston ; Feame 

 Acre^ Cheetharn Hill, Manchester, May 10, 1843. 



Note on the Habits of Dytiscus punctulatus. I have several times kept specimens 

 of Dytiscus punctulatus in confinement, both singly and in pairs, but never succeeded 

 in preserving them more than a few months ; whereas Esper is said to have kept D. 

 marginalis alive three years and a half — an extraordinary longevity, which Stephens 

 attributes, with great probability, to its celibacy. When I kept a pair together, I al- 

 ways found that the male died first ; and his dead body had generally been mutilated 

 and pretty nearly devoured by his widow. The females were at all times much more 

 voracious than the males. I generally fed them with raw beef, of which they sucked 

 the juices; but in summer I sometimes supplied them with small aquatic insects, 

 which they seized with their fore feet, and tore to pieces with their mandibles, reject- 

 ing the elytra and other hard parts. I also fed them on earth-worms, and once intro- 

 duced into the bottle a small frog, about an inch and a half long ; on my return a few 

 hours after, the frog had been despatched and partly devoured, and this by a single 

 specimen. The larva of this and other large Dytisci is even more voracious than the 

 imago. I have seen them devouring horse-leeches; and in the Anatomy-school at Ox- 

 ford is one preserved in spirits, along with a small fry of a pike, longer than itself, 

 which it had killed, and was devouring when taken by Professor Kidd. The appear- 

 ance of the insect, when seen through the medium of the water, is extremely interest- 

 ing, from the rich olive-green of the elytra (which is much heightened in this situation), 

 the yellow labrum and margins of the thorax and elytra, and the silvery brilliance of 

 the eyes, which appear as if invested with a globule of air. They speedily become fa- 

 miliarized to a certain extent, and will follow the finger round the glass, in expecta- 

 tion oHood.—Fredk. Holme ; C. C. C. Oxford, May 15, 1843. 



Note on the capture of Claviger foveolatus. Mr. Ingall took a specimen of this very 

 rare little beetle on the 29th of April last, in a stony field at tlie back of Box Hill ; and 

 on the 1st of May I captured a specimen in the same situation. Both were taken in tV 



