100 TIGER CATERPILLAR. 



broods of the same Caterpillar, these, like the little individuals 

 just encountered, have been, since an early stage, quite stationary 

 as to growth, nearly the same as to motion, have kept on the 

 same coats, instead of often changing them, and it is only in 

 mild weather that they eat sparingly of the leaves of dandelion, 

 wherewith it is not easy to supply them. When the latter arc 

 entirely nipped by frost or covered by snow, our little winterers 

 subsist as well without them, upon sleep. In this, their nice 

 and altered adaptation to a rigorous season and short supplies, 

 are not the growth and appetite even of these Caterpillars 

 worthy of notice ? 



With the arrival of April, and a plentiful supply of dock and 

 dandelion green meat, we shall find in our little "Tigers" a 

 proportionate increase of activity and appetite ; their skins, as 

 they increase in size, will be frequently cast, and in May, each 

 having attained to the full measure of its growth, will display 

 to great advantage its jerkin of black velvet, ornamented with 

 rows of white studs, from each of which springs a long tuft of 

 gold-brown grey-tipped hairs, forming, en masse, an upper 

 coat of fur. Our Caterpillar will then speedily repay us for 

 the trouble of his keep, by showing how cleverly he can make 

 his cocoon, spinning it of his own silk, interweaving it with 

 hair plucked from his own body, and eking out these natural 

 materials by extraneous ones, such as grains of earth, pieces of 

 leaf, or even bits of paper when placed within his reach. 

 Shut up in this secure asylum he will become a chrysalis, and 



