Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 4 (1846).djvu/118

1284 nary specimens. Also in the latter locality particularly dark examples of Telephorus testaceus, which is the only instance of all which have been hitherto mentioned, in which the change has been from light to dark. In like manner I might enumerate other species equally remarkable, but T trust that those already mentioned are sufficient to verify my observations of the extreme liability to change, which, more or less, most insects possess when placed within the immediate influence of the sea. How to account for it I know not. I mention it as a mere fact, and leave it for others to assign a rea- son for its existence. — T. Vernon Wollaston, B.A.; Jesus College, Cambridge, March 9th, 1846.

much struck during a recent visit in South Wales at the to- tally different set of insects which were constantly occurring (mixed up of course with many species which are abundant everywhere) to those which I had been accustomed to observe in other districts. I think, therefore, a few remarks on them may not be devoid of interest. Although in Coleoptera, every department seemed to possess its rarities peculiar to the locality ; still I cannot say that the numbers in any one given family bore anything like a steady ratio to the numbers in any other (taking the size of each department, respectively, into consideration) ; for some certainly preponderated to an incredible ex- tent above the rest, and none perhaps so much so as the Aphodii and Brachelytra. In the genus Aphodius I was particularly fortunate, a very great number of species having come beneath my notice, and that too in an unfavorable season, and then my researches in many other departments comparatively failed. With the assistance of Mr. Dill- wyn's ' Catalogue of the Coleoptera of Swansea (for a copy of which I am indebted to the author), a work most useful in pointing out the neighbouring localities ; and having been fortunate enough to meet with several rarities unnoticed in his list ; I succeeded in numbering upwards of forty species of the genus during a ramble of ten days along the southern coast.

Aphodius Sus, which is generally considered rare, occurs in the greatest profusion on the sea-shore near Swansea. On Sketty Bur- rows (where I found them crawling up the sand hills in company with Ægialia globosa and Phylan gibbus, I might have taken thousands ; but on the coast of Pembrokeshire and Caermarthen I could not dis- cover the smallest traces of them.