32 LEPIDOPTERA. 



Usually very constant in colour and markings, but I have 

 seen a female specimen, captured by Mr. Percy Richards, 

 which has the fore wings extraordinarily broad and the " bird's- 

 wing " mark much more of a red-brown than usual. 



On the wing at the end of May and through June, also 

 occasionally and rarely as a second generation in August or 

 September. 



Lakva nearly cylindrical, but very slightly thickest at the 

 tenth and eleventh segments and tapering smaller toward the 

 head; anal segment very thick and blunt. Head rather 

 small, the lobes rounded, shining brown streaked with black; 

 a shining greenish-black plate on the second segment ; dorsal 

 region of the body red-brown dotted with yellow and black ; 

 dorsal line slender, white, edged on both sides with black, 

 and continued through a black bar streaked with white 

 which occupies the third segment, and also through the 

 dorsal plate, which it neatly divides ; subdorsal stripe 

 black-brown, followed by two similar parallel stripes ; spira- 

 cular stripe broad, yellow ; undersurface and legs blackish- 

 brown. 



July and August on dock, sorrel, and Pohjfjomim, feeding 

 at night and hiding under leaves on the ground in the day- 

 time. 



Pupa finely sculptured with minute pits, shining brown. 

 Subterranean ; in tRis condition through the winter. 



The moth comes readily to sugar and occasionally to light. 

 It inhabits open woods and well-timbered country, but is 

 rather local; common in Surrey, Hants, Middlesex, Berk- 

 shire, and Oxfordshire, but apparently scarce in some parts 

 of Kent, though common in others ; also said to be scarce 

 in Sussex and Dorset, though in them it must have 

 favoured localities. Rare in Devon and not recorded in 

 Cornwall, but found locally in Somerset, Gloucestershire, 

 Herefordshire and Worcestershire; and much more rarely 



