LEPIDOPTERA. 307 



the second and third rings are green ; the rest of the body is 

 brown, variegated with white on the back, and on it there are a 

 very few short hairs, hardly visible to the naked eye. When fully 

 grown, it measures an inch or more in length. Though mostly 

 solitary in their habits, sometimes three or four of these caterpil- 

 lars are found near together, and eating the leaves of the same twig. 

 Towards the end of September they descend from the trees, and 

 make their cocoons, which are thin and almost transparent, re- 

 sembling parchment in texture, and are covered generally with 

 bits of leaves on the outside. The caterpillars remain in their 

 cocoons a long time before changing to chrysalids, and the moth 

 does not come out till the following summer. There are proba- 

 bly two broods in the course of one season, for I have taken the 

 moths early in August. In Georgia the caterpillar made its cocoon 

 on the thirtieth of May, and was transformed to a moth fourteen 

 days afterwards. This moth is the Nolodonta unicornis, or uni- 

 corn moth, so called from the horn on the back of the caterpillar. 

 The fore-wings are light brown, variegated with patches of green- 

 ish white and with wavy dark brown lines, two of which enclose a 

 small whitish space near the shoulders ; there is a short blackish 

 mark near the middle ; the tip and the outer hind margin are 

 whitish, tinged with red in the males; and near the outer hind 

 angle there are one small white and two black dashes ; the hind- 

 wings of the male are dirty white, with a dusky spot on the inner 

 hind angle ; those of the female are sometimes entirely dusky ; 

 the body is brownish, and there are two narrow black bands across 

 the forepart of the thorax. The wings expand from one inch and 

 a quarter to one inch and a half, or nearly. 



Our fruit-trees seem to be peculiarly subject to the ravages 

 of insects, probably because the native trees of the forest, which 

 originally yielded the insects an abundance of food, have been 

 destroyed to a great extent, and their places supplied only par- 

 tially by orchards, gardens, and nurseries. Numerous as are the 

 kinds of caterpillars now found on cultivated trees, some are 

 far more abundant than others, and therefore more often fall un- 

 der our observation, and come to be better known. Such for 

 instance, are certain gregarious caterpillars that swarm on the 

 apple, cherry, and plum trees towards the end of summer, strip- 



