TRIFID.-E 339 



and ash, feeding on the flowers and seeds, but if these are 

 scarce, upon the leaves. 



Pupa apparently undescribed, in the earth ; but this con- 

 dition is not assumed for some weeks after the spinning up 

 of the larva. 



The moth hides in the daytime among dead leaves, thick 

 herbage, and bushes ; at dusk it comes with great eagerness 

 to sugar, ivy-bloom, ripe blackberries, honeydew, rotten 

 apples, or indeed any kind of sweet substance ; it has even been 

 found, in plenty, imbibing moisture from withered hawthorn 

 leaves upon which rain has fallen. Common in woods and 

 well-timbered districts throughout the United Kingdom even 

 to the Shetland Isles. Abroad its range is not northern, but 

 extends through Central Europe, Sweden, Northern Italy, 

 South Finland and Southern Russia, In North America the 

 form called fcrruginoidcs appears to be no more than a 

 local race of this species, I can find no reliable distinctive 

 character. 



3. O. pistacina, ScMff. — Expanse If to 1| inch. Fore 

 wings rather narrow, slightly pointed, some uniform shade of 

 red-drab, red-brown or dull drab; orbicular and reniform 

 stigmata both narrow, oblique in opposite directions ; on the 

 costa before the apex is an oblique black or black-brown 

 wedge. Hind wings smoky-brown. 



Antennas of the male simple, very minutely ciliated, red- 

 brown ; palpi short, dark purple-brown, apical joint short 

 and blunt ; eyes naked, deep black, front and back lashes 

 thin, black ; head purple-brown ; thorax agreeing in colour 

 with the fore wings, with a faintly darker bar across the 

 front of the collar, and the scales at the back drawn together 

 into a small pointed prostrate tuft ; fascicles smoke-colour ; 

 abdomen dark smoky-brown with small lateral tufts ; anal 

 tuft red-brown. Fore wings rather narrow ; costa long and 

 straight but more curved near the apex, which is decidedly 



