216 INSECT MISCELLANIES. 



distances, even when placed in concealment. Upon 

 this is founded the practice of semhUn^-, as it is called 

 by the London collectors, among whom, as we learn 

 from Barbut and Harris, it has been long in use, for 

 entrapping the males of the fox-moth [Lasiocampa 

 Rubi), the grass-egger {L. Trifolii), and others. 

 ^ It is a frequent practice,' says Haworth, * with 

 the London aurelians, when they breed a female of 

 the iappit-moth ( Gasteropacha quercifolia), and 

 some other day-flying species, to take her in a box 

 with a gauze lid into the vicinity of the woods, where, 

 if the weather be favourable, she never fails to attract 

 a numerous train of males, whose only business ap- 

 pears to be an incessant, rapid, and undulating flight 

 in search of the females. One of these is no sooner 

 descried, than they become so much enamoured of 

 their fair kinswoman, as absolutely to lose all fear for 

 their own personal safety, which, at other times, is 

 effectually secured by the reiterated evolutions of their 

 strong and rapid wings. So fearless, indeed, have 

 I beheld them on these occasions, as to climb up and 

 down the sides of the cage which contained the dear 

 object of their eager pursuit, in exactly the same 

 manner as honey bees which have lost themselves 

 chmb up and down the glasses of a window.' 



In other instances this does not succeed. In the 

 spring of 1830 we bred a female of the lime-hawk 

 moth {Sme7'inthus Tilice, Latreille), and placed 

 her on a small lime-tree, planted in a garden-pot, and 

 lefl her at full liberty, trusting to the known station- 

 ary habits of female insects for not losing her. In 

 this we were not deceived, for though the tree con- 

 tained only a single stem about three feet high, she 

 never lefl it, remaining upon the same leaf some- 

 times for several days without stirring, and when she 

 did move, it was only to perambulate the plant, agitat- 

 ing her wings the while (as she did while stationary) 



