STRANGE INSECT. 
195 
I wandered on in the clear sunshine, along the 
sandy shore, with its heaps of drift wood ; picking 
up ground-beetles under great chips of trees, felled 
long ago by hunters ; detecting Cecina manchurica, 
a new form of mollusk, under damp logs near the 
sea. I was half maddened by mosquitoes in the 
cool shade of crowded trees ; the gauze veil which I 
shipped in despair to guard my face from their 
attacks half blinded me. 
A strange insect in the air, flying like a longi- 
corn, arrested my attentioh. At risk of broken 
shins I gave chase to it, and captured it. I found 
it to be a Myrmeleon-like Neuropteron, with curious 
cup-shaped knobs at the end of its long antennoe. 
I passed on among the prostrate branches of a huge 
linden tree, lately felled by fishermen, and still laden 
with blossoms, from which bees were busy extracting 
nectar. I came across bushes crowded with Canthari, 
or blistering-beetles, of a pale red colour, with green 
head and thorax. Hearing an ominous rustle of 
dead leaves on the dry, elevated ground, I looked 
,and saw the slow, fat, undulating form of a great- 
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