4 LEPIDOPTERA. 



dark browa ; body smooth purplish-brown ; undersurface 

 from the spiracles, and also the legs, paler ; a faint dorsal 

 paler line is visible chiefly at the edge of each segment ; 

 subdorsal line a little more distinct and paler ; raised dots 

 shining dark brown ; spiracles black ; hind ridge of the anal 

 plate and tips of the ventral prolegs dark ochreous brown. 

 (Condensed from Buckler.) 



April to July, on Erio])liovwiii vaginatuni (Hare's tail 

 cotton-grass), feeding inside the stems just above the root- 

 stocks ; making a round hole in the side of the stem through 

 which the excrement is cast out. Mr. C. E. Stott states that 

 the young caterpillar when hatched in April at once enters 

 the young shoot of the cotton-grass, and is little given to 

 wandering. 



Pupa half an inch long, moderately thick in proportion, 

 widest across the thorax, thence diminishing a little toward 

 the blunt and rounded anal extremity, which is furnished 

 with two sharp bristle-like spikes meeting near their points, 

 but has hardly any projecting cremaster ; wing-cases well 

 defined, not very projecting, smooth and shining, almost 

 devoid of sculpture ; on the dorsal and abdominal segments 

 the only sculpture is a very narrow band of minute pits on 

 the anterior margin of each ; colour red-brown, abdominal 

 segments rather paler. In a slight cocoon in the middle of 

 a shoot or tuft of the cotton-grass, or under stones on the 

 ground. 



The male in its favourite moorland haunts is a very lively 

 creature, and flies briskly about among heather and cotton- 

 grass in the afternoon sunshine ; after a short flight, evidently 

 for its own pleasure, it settles on the tip of one of the long 

 leaves of the Erioplurrmn, and instantly runs down its under- 

 side to the ground, where it is quite concealed ; or when it 

 rests on the heather, taking the same course on the smallest 

 alarm. But its favourite time of flight is early dusk, and 

 then it dashes about in multitudes, and at the wildest speed. 



