NOTES—ORIGINAL AND SELECTED. 245
Ascogaster Annularis Hym. at Manor Park.—Mr. W. Paskell,
in the Entomologist for August 1926, records the occurrence of this rare
Brachonid on the trunk of a lime-tree in his garden at Manor Park,
Essex, in company with several specimens of the beautiful little moth,
Chrysoclista lineella Clerk, which is common in the neighbourhood. It
is considered probable that the Brachonid parasitises the larva of this
moth. Editor.
Recent Palaeolithic Discoveries in the Colne Valley.—At
the Oxford meeting of the British Association in August last, Miss Nina
Layard gave a paper on "A Provincial Magdalenian Flint Industry from
the Colne Valley, Essex," in the Anthropology section. She exhibited
a collection of small, finely worked flint implements, the result of two
and a half years' work in a gravel pit in the Colne Valley. The industry
belongs to that puzzling "transitional" period that may be bracketed
as somewhere between late Palaeolithic and early Neolithic times, and the
attention of prehistorians has of late been focussed upon it. Each new
discovery of flint implements showing Aurignacian characters, yet per-
sisting up to Magdalenian times, is, in consequence, of importance as
possibly throwing new light on this difficult subject. Such discoveries
in Creswell Caves, Paviland, and other English cave dwellings are already
known, and a few surface finds bearing the same character have been
recognised.
The fact that in the Colne Valley gravel pit, a veritable settlement
of these late Palaeolithic folk had now been brought to light showed
that when caves were not available they could reconcile themselves
to a life in the open. The implement-bearing deposit, which was a strong
loam overlying valley gravels, was well sealed down, and kept intact
from superficial disturbance, and the artifacts were found at depths
varying from one and a half to three feet below the surface. Sections
through the pit revealed hearths, and what appeared to be either hut
floors or hollowed places for wind-screens.
The implements found included delicately finished gravette points,
with dos rabbatu work, hollow scrapers, denticulated tools, angle flakes,
and many well-known "cave types." The small cores were very neatly
worked, and in some cases converted into burins. All the implements
were of diminutive size when compared with their Continental parallels.
The Times, August 11th, 1926.
Goosander at Booking.—A pair of these birds, shot at Bocking in 1857,
are still preserved. The case containing them is labelled:—"Golden
Crested Grebe [sic], shot by Oliver Gosling, near Mr. Hobbs' Mill, Feb.
15, 1857." The mill in question is now known as Straits Mill, being
the easternmost of the three water-mills in Bocking, on the Blackwater,
approaching Stisted. Mr. Gosling was a well-known brewer here, and
the case was purchased at a sale after his death. Bocking is about twenty
miles distant from the coast. Alfred Hills.
Dipsacus pilosus at Earl's Colne.—There is a. strong clump of the
Lesser Teasel on the bank of the river Colne near Chalkney Mill: the plant
seems now to be very rare in the county.
Carduus acaulis at Gosfield.—There is a strong patch of the Dwarf
Thistle in the Park at Crosfield Hall. Alfred Hills.