82 LEPIDOPTERA. 



along the nervnre. In the collections of Messrs. Sydney Webb 

 and F. J. Haubuiy are specimens with the fore wings very rich 

 red, and others in which the median nervure is deeply striped 

 with black ; and in the latter a female with the dots along the 

 hind margin greatly enlarged. 



On the wing in August and September. 



Larva long and very slender, with all the legs fairly well 

 developed, body very cylindrical and uniform in substance 

 throughout ; head fully rounded, broadest in front, glossy 

 pale brown with still paler papilla3 ; mouth darker brown ; 

 ocelli black ; dorsal and anal plates glossy pale brown ; 

 ground colour of the back and sides light semi-transparent 

 yellowish-green, that of the undersurface rather paler; dorsal 

 line faintly deeper green, showing more or less the pulsating 

 dorsal vessel ; subdorsal and spiracular stripes of the breadth of 

 the intermediate spaces, brighter and deeper green ; spiracles 

 narrowly ovate, light red, outlined with black; raised dots 

 very inconspicuously ringed with paler green ; legs furnished 

 with brown hooks. As it becomes quite full fed it is shorter 

 and stouter, the stripes paler, and the skin more translucent. 



July and August within the lower compacted parts of the 

 leaves of Iris pseudacorus ; sometimes two in one plant, but 

 more frequently only one, feeding on the young central leaf 

 in the heart of the plant. It often removes, however, not 

 only from the leaves of one plant to another, but sometimes 

 enters the flower-stem, whence, after feeding on the central 

 pith down almost to the root, it retires to attack another 

 plant. When about half-grown it frequently acquires a taste 

 for Sparganium ramosum, inhabiting therein the basal part 

 of the trigonous leaf-stem ; or sometimes it enters the stem 

 of Ti/plia angustifolia. On first entering a fresh leaf of Iris 

 it throws to some distance from its hole a quantity of pale 

 " frass," but afterwards allows the excrement to accumulate 

 in its tunnel ; but when it enters a stem and mines down- 

 wards it ejects all " frass." (Adapted from Buckler.) 



