404 THE BUTTERFLIES OF NEW ENGLAND. 



resemblance to the egg-clusters of Clisiocampa americana, each row form- 

 ing a nearly straight line along the stem, and the eggs of one row usually 

 opposing the interspaces of the preceding series ; there were ninety in all, 

 in twelve rows, the longest row containing nine eggs ; the mass was 7.75 

 mm. long and, including the stem, 2.75 mm. broad; these eggs, found by 

 Mr. Clapp, were laid May 6, and presented by him to tlie Boston Society 

 of Natural History ; although immersed in benzine for two or three minutes, 

 every one hatched. A third cluster, laid May 19, consisted of nineteen 

 eggs side by side in irregular rows on one side of a terminal twig. The 

 twig was cut off with a pair of shears and fell to the ground, the butterfly 

 with it, and she only left the twig after it had reached the ground. The 

 female during oviposition rested head downward with closed erect wings. 

 A female in confinement laid one hundred and twenty-three eggs in several 

 masses on the under surface of a willow twig. She lived eight days after 

 it and still had numerous eggs in her body. A fourth instance was last 

 spring on May 18, when Dr. George Dimmock was fortunate enough to 

 observe in New Hampshire a female in the act of oviposition. She was 

 seated on the tip of a twig of willow, head downward with outspread 

 wings. The insect was probably frightened away before oviposition was 

 completed, but she had already laid, by eleven o'clock in the morning, 

 three clusters of eggs on this one twig, containing altogether over two 

 hundred eggs. They were interrupted at both ends by the half-opened 

 leaves, which evidently caused the separation of the mass into three parts, 

 one of them containing sixty-four eggs, mostly arranged in six rows down 

 the twig ; another thirty-four, irregularly disposed ; and a third more than 

 one hundred, the last more nearly encircling the twig than the others and 

 partly arranged in somewhat regular rows, though in no case could any 

 row be traced regularly through the mass. 



Their time of duration in general is from nine to sixteen days. 



Habits of the caterpillar. In hatching, — an operation which often 

 consumes half a day, — the caterpillars bite the shell only around the 

 outer edge of the summit, sometimes leaving the prominent ribs until the 

 last, and, when only one or two are left, force up the lid thus formed, 

 usually tearing it quite off in their exit. They do not eat the forsaken 

 shells, but, moving rapidly off, seek a leaf upon which they at once range 

 themselves side by side in compact rows, their heads always thereafter re- 

 maining together at the edge of the eaten leaf. If placed separately upon 

 the same leaf, they immediately range themselves side by side. When 

 young they eat only the parenchyma ; afterwards they devour the whole 

 leaf excepting the principal veins ; finally all but the midrib. They spin 

 a sort of thin web (81 : 1 ) which Meyer Diir has compared to that of the 

 European Gastropacha lanestris, enclosing the whole twig (but not the 

 leaves) upon which they are feeding, nor ever leave this carpet nest until 



