i8S2.] 129 



Soon after the second moult it is very dark on tlie back with a 

 deep and subdued blackish olive-green colour, while the belly has a 

 much lighter tint of the same, these are separated by a spiracular 

 stripe of bright yellow, the head, the side margins of the neck-plate, 

 and the warty spots on the upper surface are shining black, on each 

 side of the back are two very fine and much interrupted series of white 

 linear dots, less broken on the second segment to the end of the fourth 

 than on the others, the warty spots on the ventral surface are of the 

 ground-colour, having dark olive-brown centres. 



Directly after the third moult and for a day or so the ground- 

 colour of the larva appears perfectly black, which enhances the bril- 

 lancy of the broken white lines and the yellow spiracular stripes, but 

 by degrees, after it settles down to feed again and grow, the black 

 skin expands and the ground-colour of the back becomes more and 

 more green until it is again of a blackish olivaccous-green, when the 

 length ranges from 13 to 16 mm. 



It now consumes a great quantity of food and the plump skin 

 begins to shine a little ; at the end of about ten days it attains full- 

 growth, of an average length of 21 mm., and is thick in proportion, 

 tapering a little at each end, the anal legs extended behind in a line 

 with the body ; the glossy black head has the upper lip light green, 

 edged at the mouth with black, the papillae colourless, the side margins 

 of the plate on the second segment and the warty tubercles eacli 

 with a hair are black and glossy, the upper series of broken linear 

 white dots commence rather wide apart on the front margin of the 

 second segment, and in their course down the back form a base to the 

 upper-side of each first pair of tubercles, the lower series commence 

 on the third segment and are still more interrupted, the spiracular 

 stripe of very bright and deep yellow begins on the second segment 

 and extends to the thirteenth, another narrower stripe begins on the 

 fifth and follows almost close below, of either pale primrose-yellow or 

 whitish, the circular spiracles are yellowish-brown with shining black 

 centres, the belly is of a dingy drab-green, less dark than the back, 

 the anterior legs are greenish, the ventral and anal legs almost colour- 

 less : after the ten days' feeding and while still eating at intervals it 

 gradually contracts its length, and the dark back assumes a bright 

 purplish-violet coloured ground more shining than before, when it is 

 very beautiful, but in two more days' time it ceases to eat, and then 

 the spiracular yellow stripes lose their brilliancy, while it lingers a 

 few hours before spinning its cocoon on or just below the earth, wherein 



