THE GENUS ACRONYCTA AND ITS ALLIES. 123 



reasons in favour of such a supposition seem otherwise want- 

 ing. The disposition of the tubercles is that normal in the 

 other species. 



After the first moult (2nd skin), the general impression is of 

 a black larva, but really it is rufo-fuscous, with a white dorsal 

 and sub-dorsal line, but the tubercles are very large and black, 

 their bases being nearly continuous. On the second segment 

 the tubercles are separably distinguishable, although apparently 

 fused together. On 3 and 4 the tubercles are smaller, and 

 these segments look pale and brindled ; on 5, 6, 7, 8, g and 

 12, the tubercles are so large as to make these segments look 

 black, they stand up very pointedly, terminating in a stiff 

 bristle, and there is a transverse ridge connecting the anterior 

 trapezoidals and another, still more pronounced, connecting the 

 posterior ; on the loth segment, the tubercles are smaller and 

 like large black islets on a white area. On the nth, they are 

 quite small and the segment looks nearly white. The 12th 

 segment is decidedly humped with pronounced tubercles. The 

 13th and 14th look white. There are pale dorsal, sub-dorsal 

 and lateral lines, and the 12th segment is white beneath. The 

 pointedness of the tubercles gives an angularity to each seg- 

 ment taken individually, essentially of the same character as 

 that which I have called echinate, where the tubercles have 

 several hairs, here they have only one. 



In the 3rd skin (after 2nd moult), it has assumed the bird 

 dirt plumage, which is so well known as characteristic of the 

 immature larva, and which is as much or more pronounced in 

 the next (4th) skin. It is to be remarked that the whiteness 

 of the nth segment (pale colour being one of the charac- 

 teristics of this segment as "weak " in the Acronyctas) of the 

 newly hatched larva, is the basis from which the white area of 

 the terminal segment has been gradually developed, making this 

 larva of all the others, the one that carries this feature to a 

 marked degree to so late a stage as the 4th skin. 



The head and following segments to the loth are black 

 dorsally, with indications of a white dorsal, and a pale sub- 

 dorsal line, chiefly as yellowish marks at the incisions of the 

 segments. The 4th, and to some extent the 3rd, have this 

 most pronounced. On the 4th segment, the anterior aspect 

 of the hump which the trapezoidals make on each segment is 

 orange yellow. The white lateral line is here also most 

 obvious, giving altogether a paler mottled tone to the 3rd and 

 4th segments. The loth segment, described as black, has 



