1867.J yy 
one fright about them, However. One has heard of the grass growing under the 
feet of a sluggard ; and it is a fact that during the winter, while they were resting 
almost as motionless as the withered stalks of their food, two of my three larvae 
became decidedly tinged with bright green ; and, on examination with a lens, I found 
that this tint was caused by the young growth of a species of moss ! (Tortula — ?J. 
However, it luckily proved to be less than skin deep, and was witliout difficulty 
got rid of at the first spring moult. 
When ftill-fed the larva is about an inch in length, following the imi.taria type, 
i. e., long, cylindrical, slender, and tapering slightly towards the head ; the skin 
evenly ringed ; the head a little flattened above, and rounded at the sides. 
The colouring is so plain and dull in many of the Acidalia larvae, that one 
fears a detailed description may give the idea of something much more ornamental 
than the reality ; and yet it is necessary to give the little details, in order to show 
how the various species differ. 
The ground colour of emutaria, then, is a pale ochreous-grey ; the dorsal line 
is a very fine whitish-ochreous thread, distinct at the beginning of each segment, 
but soon almost extinguished by the union of the blackish lines which border it, 
and which shade off towards the sub-dorsal line through a brown into the ground 
colour, making the region of the back look darker than the sides : just at each 
segmental fold there is a pair of brown or blackish wedge-shaped spots : the sub- 
dorsal line is also a very fine whitish thread, edged below with a black line, which 
is most distinct about the middle of each segment, whence also some very fine 
oblique lines slope downwards behind each spiracle. 
The spiracles are black ; and just below them comes a sooty-brown line 
shading off gradually into the pale gi'ey of the centre of the belly. 
Of the two larvaa which I retained for myself, one spun up against the side of 
the flower-pot, covering itself with a thin but opaque flat web, into which it drew 
a few bits of moss, &c. ; the other spun up on the sui'face of the earth in the pot, 
forming an irregular oval cocoon as big as a horse-bean, and nearly covered with 
fine bits of earth and grains of sand ; the pupae I did not examine until after the 
exit of the moths. — John Hellins, Exeter, July 29th, 1867. 
A curio^is visitor at sugar. — I had " sugared" abundantly along the lovely 
" Waters Meet" valley near Lynmouth, N. Devon, on the evening of the 14th June 
last, and, on re-visiting, early the ensuing morning, the scene of operations, found 
at the foot of one of the trees a melancholy object for compassion and warning. 
The common bat {Vespertilio pipestrelltis) lay in prostrate humiliation before 
me, so far gone as to appear " tight "-ened even to death ! On attempting to lift 
him, however, a rollicking, one-sidy flounder or two, accompanied by a hiccupy 
squeak, affirmed " all right " so unmistakeably, that, solemnly registering one more 
vow against the Circean cup, I lifted him carefully by the collar of his coat, and 
deposited him in the broad space made by the branches of a noble oak-tree, some 
five feet from the ground, in order that he might recover and regi-et at leisui-e and 
in safety the ignoble example to which he had yielded, and the firmament from 
whence he had fallen. On my return, some hours later, my jovial brother collector 
had departed — " nor in the cleft, nor near the rock was he." — Edw. Hopley, 14, 
South Bank, Regent's Park. 
