294 INSECTS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



there are others that are concealed from observation in stems and 

 roots, which they pierce in various directions, and devour only 

 the wood and pith ; their habits, in this respect, being exactly like 

 those of the JEgerians among the Sphinges. These insects be- 

 long to a family of Bombyces, by some naturalists called Zeu- 

 zeradj;, and by others Hepialid^e, both names derived from 

 insects included in the same group. The caterpillars of the 

 Zeuzerians are white or reddish white, soft and naked, or slightly 

 downy, with brown horny heads, a spot on the top of the fore- 

 part of the body which is also brown and hard, and sixteen legs. 

 They make imperfect cocoons, sometimes of silk, and sometimes 

 of morsels of wood or grains of earth fastened together by gummy 

 silk. Their chrysalids, like those of the Ceratocampians, are 

 provided with notched transverse ridges on the rings, by means of 

 which they push themselves out of their holes when ready to be 

 transformed. The moths differ a good deal from each other, 

 although the appearance and habits of the caterpillars are so much 

 alike. The antennae in some are threadlike, or made up of nearly 

 cylindrical joints put together like a string of beads ; in others 

 they are more tapering, and doubly pectinated or tooihed on the 

 under-side, at least in the males ; and in Zcazera, a kind of moth 

 not hitherto found in this country, the antennae resemble those of 

 the Ceratocampians, being half-feathered in the males, and not 

 feathered in the females. The wings are rather long and narrow, 

 and are strengthened by very numerous veins. The female is pro- 

 vided with a kind of tube at the end of the body, that can be 

 drawn in and out, by means of which she thrusts her eggs into the 

 chinks of the bark or into the earth at the roots of plants. 



Of the root-eaters there is one kind which is very injurious to 

 the hop-vine in Europe. It is called HejnoJus Humuli, the hop- 

 vine Hepiolus. The caterpillar is yellowish white ; the head, a 

 spot on the top of the first and second rings, and the six fore-legs 

 are shining brown, and it is nearly naked, or has only a few short 

 hairs scattered over its body. It lives in the roots of the hop, 

 and, when about to transform, buries itself in the ground, and 

 makes a long, cylindrical cocoon or case, composed of grains of 

 earth held together by a loose silken web. The chrysalis has 

 transverse rows of little teeth on the backs of the abdominal rings, 



