264 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



coarse hairs, spreading out on all sides like the bristles of a 

 bottle-brush, and growing in clusters or tufts from little warts 

 regularly arranged in transverse rows on the surface of the 

 body. They run very fast, and when handled roll themselves 

 up almost into the shape of a ball. Many of them are very 

 destructive to vegetation, as, for example, the salt-marsh cater- 

 pillar, the yellow bear-caterpillar of our gardens, and the fall 

 web-caterpillar. When about to transform, they creep into 

 the chinks of walls and fences, or hide themselves under stones 

 and fallen leaves, where they enclose themselves in rough oval 

 cocoons, made of hairs, plucked from their own bodies, inter- 

 woven with a few silken threads. The chrysalis is smooth, 

 and not hairy, and its joints are movable. 



Some of the slender-bodied Arctians, with bristle-formed 

 antennae, which are not distinctly feathered in either sex, and 

 having the feelers slender, and the tongue longer than the 

 others, come so near to the Lithosians that naturalists arrange 

 them sometimes among the latter, and sometimes among 

 the Arctians. They belong to Latreille's genus Callimorpha 

 (meaning beautiful form), one species of which inhabits Mas- 

 sachusetts, and is called Callimorpha militaris, the soldier- 

 moth, in my Catalogue. Its fore wings expand about two 

 inches, are white, almost entirely bordered with brown, with 

 an oblique band of the same color from the inner margin to 

 the tip ; and the brown border on the front margin generally 

 has two short angular projections extending backwards on the 

 surface of the wing. The hind wings are white, and without 

 spots. The body is white ; the head, collar, and thighs buff- 

 yellow ; and a longitudinal brown stripe runs along the top of 

 the back from the collar to the tail. This is a very variable 

 moth ; the brown markings on the fore wings being sometimes 

 very much reduced in extent, and sometimes, on the contrary, 

 they run together so much that the wings appear to be brown, 

 with five large white spots. This latter variety is named 

 Callimorpha Lecontei, by Dr. Boisduval. The caterpillar is 

 unknown to me. The caterpillars of the Callimorphas are 

 more sparingly clothed with hairs than the other Arctians ; 

 and they are generally dark colored with longitudinal yellow 



