2j|,Q iN'i)Vombcr, 



worn out, is peculiarly ignitable. The excuse given for the very common crime of 

 house-burniBg in heathenism was revenge for the murrler of some near relatire. 

 — W. Wyatt Gill. (From the " Leisure Hour," 11th September, 1875.) 



[This ■will doubtless remind some of our readers of the belief once prevailing 

 in certain parts of Germany, that, according to the old Insectrfabulists, the stag- 

 beetle (-arries live coals in its jaws from house to house. — E. C. R.] 



Natural History of Xylitia rhizolitha.— On the 26th April, 1874, I had the 

 pleasure to receive from Mr. J. E. Fletcher, of Worcester, a few eggs of this species, 

 ■which ■were laid on the 21st and 22ud of the month ; and the larva> ■were hatched 

 on the first two days of May. 



At first, and for some time, they continued to feed on the green cuticle of the 

 tender young leaves of oak ; but, as they grew, began at length to eat Utile holes 

 through them. 



The egg is small for the size of the moth, and in shape is spherical, but a little 



, flattened ; it cannot strictly be called ribbed, but is covered -with thirty-five to forty 



/ longitudinal rows of pits in such regular order that their sides fonu both shallow 



I ribs and transverse reticulations ; in the centre of the upper surface is a button-like 



I round spot ornamented with a star of nine pairs of short raised lines ; the colour at 



first was almost ■white, the tinge of yellow being very slight ; on the third day, this 



turned to dull pink, afterwards blotched and streaked ■with pinkish-bro^wn, at last 



becoming ■wholly brown. 



The young larva is whitish, with a buff coloured head, until after the first moult, 

 ■when, by aid of a lens, opaque white dots and hairs coidd be discerned on it : when 

 not quite three weeks old, the larva is half-an-inch long, of a greenish-white colour, 

 showing distinctly the white raised dots and hairs ; in four weeks, it is three-quarters 

 of an inch long, and stout in proportion, of a rather pale bliush-green colour finely 

 freckled with whitish, and having slight indications of dorsal and sub-dorsal lines : 

 by this time it feeds well, eating through the leaves from the edges. 



The full-grown larva measures one inch and a quarter in length, or a trifle more 

 when stretched out in walking ; it is of uniform stoutness, and cylindrical in figvirc, 

 the head full and rounded, the hinder extremity also rounded, and but little tapered ; 

 all the legs are moderately well developed, and terminated by sharp hooks. The 

 ground colour is a rather transparent pale bluish-green, appearing colder on the back 

 and sides than it really is, from being thickly sprinkled over with minute opaque 

 whitish freckles ; these, however, are but sparingly seen on the belly, which is of a 

 rather yellower gi'cen ; the head is of a more tender green, with a patch of paler 

 freckles on the side of each lobe ; on the back of the second segment are four whitish 

 dots ; on the rest of the body the opaque whitish dorsal line is finely edged with 

 dai'ker green than the ground, but is so much interrupted as only to appear just at 

 either end of each segment ; the sub-dorsal shows similarly as a broken whitish line, 

 and less conspicuous, while the spiraeular line is indicated still more faintly, existing 

 as an interrupted series of larger whitish freckles than those ■which besprinkle the 

 skin ; the wart-likc tubercular dots are opaque whitish, each having round the base 

 a narrow unfrcckled ring of the semi-transparent green ground colour, and each 

 bearing a fine wliitish hair ; the spiracles ■white, delicately outlined with black ; the 

 terminal hooks of the legs whity-brown. 



