612 Insects. 



Note on the capture of Apate capucinus. I took a remarkably large and fine speci- 

 men of this rare insect in Kensington Gardens, in July, 1839. — F. Holme ; Oxford. 



Note on the variableness of Aphodius rufescens. Aphodius rufescens varies occa- 

 sionally to an uniform dull piceous black, having only the anterior angles of the thorax 

 rufous. Stephens does not notice this variety, and I had been at a loss to what spe- 

 cies to refer an individual which had been for some years in my cabinet, when in Sep- 

 tember, 1838, I found several others in company with the common one, and a complete 

 series of intermediate stages of suffusion. Perhaps it is an autumnal change. — Id. 



Note on the habits of a Water-beetle. I derived great amusement, a few days since 

 from watching the movements of a large Dyticus in a ditch, which the extraordinary 

 clearness of the air and water gave me unusual facilities for doing. The minnows and 

 other small fry gave way in all directions on its approach, apparently in great alarm ; 

 but I did not perceive that any symptoms of hostility were manifested by the insect, 

 whose speed appeared to be inferior to theirs, although 1 have found that specimens 

 confined in a bottle, speedily dispatched and devoured any small fish enclosed with 

 them, (Zool. 200). I was an eye-witness however to the fate of a luckless leech, upon 

 which the Dyticus darted while wriggling its way out of a tuft of aquatic herbage, 

 and seizing it, as appeared to me, with the jaws and fore feet at once, carried it off 

 under the bank. Esper, who kept one of these insects alive for a long period, states 

 that it will attack and kill the giant Hydrous piceus, by seizing it in the only vulner- 

 able part, between the head and thorax. But with all deference to the high authority 

 of the German naturalist, I much doubt the practicability of this ; since, setting aside 

 the powerful means of defence possessed by the prey, it appears impossible for a Dyti- 

 cus to seize any object except from above, its attitude in the water being always with 

 the head much lower than the other extremity, from the preponderance in swimming 

 power of the hinder limbs, which prevents its raising the head even to a horizontal pos- 

 ture ; the mandibles also are covered above by the labium, so as to be unable to act on 

 any object above them : and it is only on the under side of the neck that the Hydrous 

 can be attacked with success, as the juncture of the head is protected above by the 

 overlapping of the prothorax. — Id. 



Anecdote of long abstinence in a Beetle. Walking near Porrock-wood in Kent, on 

 the 24th of September last. T found a specimen of Melasoma Populi, which I put 

 into a card-board pill-box and forgot it. On the 28th of February I accidentally 

 opened the box and found the beetle as lively as when I put it there, its long absti- 

 nence from food appeared to have had no effect on it, but in fonr days after it died. I 

 do not remember any account of this insect living so long without food. — Geo. J. Dal- 

 man ; 61, Willow Walk, Finsbury, April 30, 1844. 



Note on the occurrence of the Glow-worm in Scotland. So far as I am aware, the 

 glow-worm is very seldom seen north of the Tweed. Two localities where it is found 

 have come to my knowledge. The one is the Girvan hills in Ayrshire, which lie on 

 the shore of the Atlantic, nearly opposite to the picturesque rock of Ailsa. The other 

 is the Muchart hills, which form a part of the Ochil range, immediately to the north 

 of the river Forth. An individual, on whose veracity the utmost dependance can be 

 placed, assures me that in the latter of these places it is not an uncommon occurrence 

 for the herd-boys to bring home half a dozen of these creatures with them when they 

 return from their evening labours. — Robert Dick Duncan. 



Note on captures of Coleoptera near Cambridge. The following insects have occur- 

 red, with one or two exceptions, in tolerable abundance during the last i'ew months at 



