THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
65
Tea was taken at 4.45 o'clock in the Fellows' Tea Room, but no
formal meeting of the Club could, in the circumstances, be held ; and
shortly before 6 o'clock, the closing time, the party dispersed and made
its various ways homewards.
ORDINARY MEETING (624TH MEETING) AND ANNUAL
MEETING (625TH MEETING).
SATURDAY, 26TH MARCH, 1927.
These meetings were held in the Physics Lecture Theatre of the
Municipal College, Romford Road, Stratford, on the afternoon of the
above date, the President, Mr. D. J. Scourfield, I.S.O., F.L.S., etc., being
in the chair. 50 members attended.
The following persons were elected members of the Club, viz :—
Miss Ethel Hockaday, of 27, Woodcote Road, Wanstead.
The Rev. William C. Hall, of 48, Arbour Lane, Springfield, Chelmsford
(as representing the Chelmsford and District Field Club).
Mr. Avery exhibited eleven topographical views of Essex, and a
MS. inventory of the household linen in use at Wanstead House in 1799,
signed by Elizh. Appleton.
Mr. Nicholson exhibited nymphs of the Scarlet Hopper, Triecphora
vulnerata Illig., found beneath the soil in a garden at Little Baddow.
Mr. Nicholson furnishes the following account of his exhibit. Probably
few of us are aware that "cuckoo-spit" is sometimes found underground.
I myself had heard and read of this subterranean froth, but until recently-
had never been fortunate enough to come across it. I am now able to
exhibit four nymphs of the Scarlet Hopper (Triecphora vulnerata Illig.)
that were sent to me on the 11th of this month by Mr. Thorrington, who
found them surrounded with "cuckoo-spit" in a cavity in the soil of his
garden at Little Baddow.
The life history of this species appears to have been quite unknown
until 1920, when Dr. Hugh Scott, of Cambridge, received from Watford
four nymphs that had been found in a disused molerun, 6 inches below
the surface, on an allotment, when the ground was being dug on May 1st.
Unfortunately the nymphs were dead when they reached Dr. Scott,
so they could only be described. In March, 1925, Mr. W. E. China, of the
Natural History Museum, had some nymphs sent to him from Slinfold
in Sussex and succeeded in rearing them to maturity in a glass jar loosely
filled with soil.
Dr. Scott's and Mr. China's nymphs were in the last instar, and those
I now exhibit are I think also. It will be noticed that the froth is of
coarser texture than ordinary "cuckoo-spit," as one would expect from
the larger size of these nymphs.
Since the adult insect appears in May it is practically certain that it
passes the winter in the larval stage, but the eggs of this species have
not yet been seen ; I hope to be able to supply this want. The eggs of the
common froghopper (Philaenus spumarius) have been found in the
winter.
The Scarlet Hopper is the largest and handsomest of our seven repre-
sentatives of the family Cercopidae of the Order Hemiptera and it is the