320 THE MOTHS OF THE BRITISH ISLES. 



obtained at honeydew, September, 1899, at Timologue, Co. 

 Cork. 



The eggs (Plate 152, Fig. 7^) are laid in batches on a leaf, 

 and more or less covered with whitish hairs. Some deposited on 

 Sept. 8, 1906, hatched on the 20th of that month. When just 

 hatched the caterpillar is greenish, paler on the last rings ; head 

 and plate on first ring shining black ; when a week old a 

 black plate appears on the last ring also. Later on the colour 

 varies from green to olive green, brownish, and dark greyish. 

 Green examples are figured on Plate 152, Fig. 7. The central 

 line is ochreous, and there are series of black bars and blackish 

 marks on the back ; along the black-edged white spiracles is a 

 pinkish brown band, edged above by an interrupted black line ; 

 the pinkish brown colour runs up the front part of each ring four 

 to eleven ; head blackish. The caterpillars were fed upon 

 plantain, dandelion, and groundsel, but they would eat the 

 foliage of any weed that was put in their cage. They formed 

 fairly tough earthen cocoons on, or just below, the surface ; but, 

 although they pupated, the moths failed to emerge, probably 

 because they were kept too dry. The ochreous or pinkish 

 brown colour of the orbicular stigma, and sometimes of the 

 reniform, distinguishes this moth; the hind wings are white with 

 a very distinct pearly gloss. 



The Small Dotted Buif {Fetilampa arcuosa). 



This pale whity-brown insect (Plate 134, Figs. 19 to 21) is often 

 without markings, and where these are present on the fore wings 

 they comprise two series of dusky dots representing two cross 

 lines, and sometimes there is a dot at the end of the cell. 

 These wings may be shaded \vith brown, and occasionally there 

 is a dark band-like shade between the series of dots, in the 

 male as well as in the smaller and narrower-winged female. 

 Var. viorrisii, Dale, seems to be a whiter form of this species. 



