CATERPILLARS. 



151 



the plantain or Glanville fritillary {Melitea cinxia), which is 

 very scarce in this country. 



Although a colony of these caterpillars is not numerous, 

 seldom amounting to a hundred individuals, the place 



Ziczac Caterpillar and Nest. 



which they have selected is not hard to discover. Their 

 abode may be seen in the meadow in form of a tuft of 

 herbage covered with a white web, which may readily be 

 mistaken, at first view, for that of a spider, but closer in- 

 spection soon corrects this notion. It is, in fact, a sort of 

 common tent, in which the whole brood lives, eats, and 

 undergoes the usual transformations. The shape of this 

 tent, for the most part, approaches the pyramidal, though 

 that depends much upon the natural growth of the herbage 

 which composes it. The interior is divided into compart- 

 ments fonned by the union of several small tents, as it 

 were, to which others have been from time to time added 

 according to the necessities of the community. 



