10 
To give an idea of the abundance of the insect on this day, I may say 
that in one favoured spot thirteen were resting on a large oak—nine g s 
and four* 2 s. The other spring insects were seen on the same day but 
were none of them present in more than their usual numbers. On the 
25th no searching was done—the entry in the diary reads simply thus: 
“Went to Chingford, weather awful, swore, and went home.” On the 
27th a single 2 emerged indoors. On March 5th a good deal of ground 
was covered and about a score of specimens turned up; the morning 
was fine but the skv clouded over gradually as the day went on; the 
weather was mild, wind N.W. but sport generally was not very good. 
On the 12th of the same month two $ s and one 2 were noticed and 
the season, so far as this species was concerned, closed at 12.30 on 
March 26th with the capture of a single $ drying its wings. Thus a 
period of seven weeks had elapsed since the first appearance. 
The insect is, I should think, an easy one to pair in captivity. I 
placed a $, which had been out a day or two, with a freshly emerged 
2 , in a fairly large wooden box, on Feb. 8th, but, though I looked at 
them morning and evening, I did not witness the pairing; however, on 
the 11th, the 2 deposited a number of fertile ova. 
I have never seen the male in the act of flying spontaneously, but 
we caused several to take the air by throwing them up. These flew 
rapidly and turned very sharply—darting forward and doubling back 
suddenly, so that they would be difficult to catch on the wing. 
In considering the possible causes of this abnormal abundance of 
the species in 1893, I will first deal with an important factor in the 
situation—the weather, beginning at the point 'when we commenced our 
search for the species, February, 1890. In 1890 one imago was found. 
Spring probably moderately favourable for larvae. In 1890-91, winter 
unusually rigorous; 1891, February very favourable for appearance of 
imago, none however found; March, April, and May cold, spring 
very backward, and perhaps unfavourable to larvae; 1891-92, winter 
again severe ; 1892, spring rather favourable to larvae; October, a wet 
month ; November fairly dry, temperature average ; December dry, 
the first week cold, with low night temperature ; then a fortnight of 
warm weather; the last week exceedingly cold, 17 to 18 degrees of frost; 
1893, January, rather dry but cold, especially the early part of the 
month ; February, a wet month, with temperature above the average ; 
March, April, and May, extremely dry; larvae (I am told) plentiful. 
The probable effect of the cold winters of 1890-91 and 1891-92, would 
be to keep down the depredations of the moles, mice, beetles, earwigs, 
&c., by extending the length of time which they spend in a state of 
torpidity, and possibly to reduce the numbers of these enemies to pupa?. 
Xo imagines were found by us in either 1891 or 1892, though February 
of the first-named year appeared to be eminently suited for emergence, 
but the cold dreary spring months of 1891 may have checked any 
increase by retarding or stopping the due development of the larva?. I 
am sorry, however, that I am unable to speak as to the frequent occur¬ 
rence or otherwise of the larvae in those years, for this would give a 
truer idea of the relative abundance; searching for the imago being 
often obstructed by the available days happening to be cold or wet. I 
do not know whether the heavy rainfall of October, 1892, may have 
favoured the pupa?. Are they liable to dry up ? As they usually, I 
believe, bury themselves to a depth of several inches, moisture, dryness 
