440 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HLST. SOCIETl, Vol. XXJ\ 



erect, fine, pointed hairs about | the length of greatest width of pupa, 

 those on the head and segment l' longer : about 5U hairs to segment 7 — 

 they are separated from each other by about their own length so that the 

 covering is not dense ; a few of the hairs about sides of hinder segments 

 of abdomen black. Colour : light green all over without any markings, 

 the front segments 1 — 3 slightly darker. L: 8 mm.; B : 3 mm. at segment 

 7, and 2-5 at middle of thorax. 



Habits. — The eggs are laid generally on the undersides of leaves 

 and alwaj'S singly ; rarely one finds them on the uppersides. The 

 little larvee are very light in coloiii- with, as usual, the segments 

 very well marked and they have long curved hairs. They eat part 

 of the egg-shell after eating their way out through the top, general- 

 ly to one side of the middle ; they never, or liardly ever, eat much 

 of it. They begin feeding on the underside by eating all but the 

 upper cuticle which then withei's so that it is always quite easy to 

 find out where they are — much easier than it is to find the egg-larva 

 or even the caterpillar after it is grown up as they are then just the 

 same green as the leaf-uppersides ; in the intei-mediate stages they 

 are various shades of green, gradually getting darker as they 

 change irom one stage to the next ; and they rest on the flower and 

 leaf-buds ^^'hich are silky hairy and grey like them so that they are 

 well protected. In the last stage only does the larva eat from the 

 edge of the leaf and it quickly demolishes all the available food 

 yielded by a single plant and has to wander along the creeping 

 roots or rhizomes to find another — often, when the plant is a yomig 

 one and has no rhizomes, it does not find another and dies of star- 

 vation ; if it does not get eaten by a spider before that. Many of 

 them are thus eaten in the early stages. The eggs do not seem to 

 be much parasitized as most of those laid produce larvas. The big 

 lavvge are occasionally attended by ants though by no means 

 always; the genus noticed was Fheidole. The growth of the 

 larva is rapid enough but not in any way abnormally so ; the 

 pupal stage is normal—about seven days. The pupation takes place 

 anywhere practically : on the underside of a leaf of the plant 

 itself, or of another plant, or on a well -protected surface of a stone, 

 &c.; the attachment is by the tail and a body-band as usual. The 

 imago flies well and erratically, hardly ever straight, in the usual 

 way of the small Lyccenidw of this type. They keep close to the 

 ground, are fond of the flowers of vetches and small acanthads 

 {Justicia, etc.) which flourish in grass-lands and like the sun ; they 

 rest with the wings closed over their backs in dull weather, often 

 with them half-open in tne intervals between flights -.md frequently 

 settle on flower-heads and grasses in the evenings to rest for the 

 night ; in the early mornings they may be thus seen with the front 

 wings well bunk between the hinder ones, covered with dew in the 

 cold weather. They are then, generally, quite numbed and may 

 easily be caught in the fingers. 



