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125 

 CLOTHES MOTHS 





Fig. I. — Clothes Moth, Tinea pellioiiella, L. 



A most remarkable specimen, due to the work of insects, has been 

 sent to the Editor by Miss Lucy C. Eaton, of Truro, Nova Scotia. 

 This consists of a piece of cotton ticking which had been used for a 

 pillow case, and the inside of which has been so completely covered 

 with fragments of feathers as to have the appearance of gray velvet or 

 plush. Without examining it under the microscope, it seems difficult 

 to believe tliat the beautifully even surface can have been produced in 

 the way described, but this is undoubtedly the case. Miss Eaton 

 writes that the pillow was made in the fall of 1889, and not opened till 

 two years afterwards. It was filled with turkey feathers, which are very 

 soft and downy at the base. Miss Eaton noticed that when this pillow 

 was placed on beds, although no one made any remarks, she more often 

 than not found it on the floor in the raorniiig. After a time, suspecting 

 nothing, she put it on her own bed, when the mystery was solved, for 

 she says " I could not sleep for the noise like something crawling slowly 

 back and forth." She turned it over and over, but it was no use, she 

 was at last obliged to serve it as it had been served on so many previous 

 occasions, and once more it was thrown to the floor. Some months 

 after, upon opening the pillow, the whole inner surface was found to be 

 entirely covered with a coating of velvety pile, and the feathers, some 

 specimens of which were forwarded, were entirely stripped of down, 

 which was cut into morsels almost as fine as dust. From the extent of 



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