SG ! September, 



Natural Hislory of Larentia oUvata. — Several years ago I bred this species, but 

 took scarcely any notes of it, and was, therefore, very glad to receive from Mrs. Wol- 

 laston, at the end of last August, some eggs which she had obtained from a moth 

 taken at Teignmouth. 



The larva; hatched, but not all at once, during the second week in September, 

 and were kept outdoors on a growing plant of Galium mollugo ; the winter being 

 mild, they continued to feed slowly all the time, and seemed to be content with 

 withered leaves, when green ones failed them ; by the last week in April they were 

 fidl-fed, and most of them became puprc during the first week in May. Tlie larva 

 of this species, like that of pectinitaria, is extremely sluggish, as miglit, indeed, be 

 concluded from a glance at its form. 



The egg of olivata is rather small for the moth, of nn oval form, plump; the 

 shell glistening, with no raised reticulation, but yet covered with the little facets as it 

 were, which should be enclosed by reticulation ; colour at first pale straw ; then a 

 palish vermilion-red ; at last turning to a pale livid hue. 



The young larva is pale vermilion-red, with blackish head, but this gay colour 

 does not last long, soon giving way to the dingy appearance worn for the remainder 

 of this stage, and the description of the full-grown larva will suffice for it altogether. 



The full-grown larva is rather over five-eighths of an inch in length, very stumpy 

 in figure, rugose and warty, with segmental divisions distinct, head not so wide as 

 second, with lobes rounded, although narrow, the front and hind segments tapering 

 very slightly. 



The ground colour is a pale ochreous, mottled with deeper brown, and marked 

 longitudinally with lines of darker brown ; the dorsal line begins blackish on the 

 second, becomes dark brown after that and is continuous up to the fourth, then it 

 becomes a series of dashes on the front part of each segment up to the tenth, thence 

 again it becomes continuous ; on either side of the dorsal line come a sub-dorsal and 

 lateral similar line, continuous to the end of the fourth, and fi'om the tenth to thir- 

 teenth, but on the intermediate segments interrupted and turned aside by the warts ; 

 in this manner the sub-dorsal line is pushed in towards the dorsal at the middle of 

 each segment, giving somewhat the look of a curved X' only the limbs of the letter 

 do not touch ; the lower or lateral dark line is also waved in its course by similar 

 obstructions ; the usual dots are large tubei'cular warts of the ground colour, and 

 furnished with stiff bristles, and, on segments six to nine, there are besides pairs of 

 conspicuous, transverse, oval warts paler than the ground ; the spiracles are incon- 

 spicuous, being small and blackish j tlie head brownish with dusk^- freckles, and set 

 with bristles ; the belly more mottled than the back, and with traces of a central, 

 and jxiir of lateral, dusky lines. In its usual position of rest, the larva keeps the 

 head and thoracic segments all humped together. 



The cocoon is very slight, formed on the surface of the soil,inuler a leaf or stem 

 for covering, and with particles of earth, &c., drawn in ; the pupa is three-eighths of 

 an inch long, the thorax swelling above the line of the back, the eyes somewhat 

 projecting, the abdomen tapering off gi-adually, and ending in a small blunt spike 

 furnished with two large and six small spines with curled tips, by which the pupa is 

 attached to the silk of the cocoon ; the colour briglit reddish, the abdomen deeper 

 reddish, the spike dark bruvvn. — Jl'UN IIellins, Exeter : June 2>id, 1S7-1- 



