AUt'TlID.TS. — PORTHESIA. 65 



With reference to the assembling propensity of the Lep.-Pome- 

 ridiana, an interesting notice is given in the Magazine of Natural 

 History for November last, by Mr. Davies of Portsmouth, in which, 

 amongst other facts, it is stated, that the writer, having bred some 

 females of this species, had the windows of the room in which they 

 were confined literally besieged by numberless males, anxious to 

 obtain admittance to the objects of their desires. 



Genus LXVl. — Foiithesia *mihi. 



Palpi very short, descending, slightly hairy, cylindric, triarticulate, the terminal 

 joint exposed ; the basal minute, about half as long as the terminal, the inter-- 

 mediate longest : maxiUa: very short : antennw short, especially in the females, 

 acute, bipectinated in both sexes to the apex, the pectinations shortest in the 

 females : head small, very pilose : thorax and abdomen somewhat robust and 

 woolly: wings deflexed, subtrigonate, thickly clothed with scales: legs robust, 

 short : femora, tihicc, and anterior tarsi, densely fringed with elongate hairs. 

 Larva with close fascicles of hair down the sides, rather longest on the neck, 

 the back without tufts : pupa slightly hairy, acute, enclosed in a slight foUi- 

 culus : eggs enveloped in down. 



This genus, to which I have applied the name Porthesia, in 

 allusion to the destructive habits of its larva, may be known from 

 the two preceding by the opacity and texture of its wings, the 

 stoutness and hairiness of its legs, the great bulk of the tuft at the 

 apex of the abdomen in the males, and the downy mass in the 

 females, the brevity of the antennse, the minuta basal joint of the 

 palpi, and other less important characters. The larvae also differ, 

 and the eggs are enveloped in down. 



Sp. 1. chrysoiThoea. Niveus, ano harhato ferrugineo, radiis antennaruni Inteo- 

 fulvis. (Exp. abr. $ 1 unc. 3 — 7 hn, $ 1 unc. 7 — 10 lin.) 



Ph. Bo. chrysorrhoea. Linne. — Don. i. pi. 10. — For. chrysorrhcea. Steph. Catal. 

 JVo. 6104. 



Antennse tawny-luteous, with the shaft white : palpi dusky-brown : head, thorax, 

 and wings above snow-white, the latter with a dusky spot at the anal angle of 

 the anterior, which spot is nearly, or quite obsolete, in the female, and some- 

 times nearly black in the male; the anterior wings beneath with a broad 

 dusky cloud: abdomen white, with its apex bright tawny-luteous in both 

 sexes. 



The male has the base of the anterior wings frequently edged with black, and 

 the anal spot composed of several smaller ones ; and not unfrequently two or 

 three dusky spots towards the base. 



Xlo^6n<rii, vastatio. 



Haustellata. Vol. II. 1st December, 1828. 



