TORTKICID.li—CENECTRA. 185 



margin. Hind wings rather squared, smoky brown, cilia 

 yellow-brown. Female, fore wings more narrow and pointed, 

 unicolourous red-brown. Hind wings smoky brown. 



On boggy heaths a permanent variety is found, having the 

 ground colour and markings paler, and less rich in tone ; and 

 with the female also paler. 



On the wing in July. 



Larva variable, rather slendei-, cylindrical, or when full- 

 grown, slightly flattened, active, very pale green, with a 

 narrow, darker green dorsal line ; raised dots small, whitish, 

 each with a very delicate hair ; head and dorsal plate jet 

 black, anal plate yellow. Or dorsal region grey, ventral region 

 greenish, the raised dots large and distinctly white, and the 

 dorsal plate brown, bordered on both sides with black. 



Autumn till May in rolled leaves of Statice limonium. Aster 

 tripolium, FlanUajo marithna, Narthedum ossifmyum, Stacliys, 

 Salvia, Clematis, Artemisia, and herbaceous plants generally. 

 In this country it seems first to have been reared from Iris 

 fcetidissima, not a usual food plant. Abroad it especially 

 frequents the vine, feeding on the leaves and doing much 

 mischief. 



Pupa brown, spun up among leaves of its food plant. 



The male is said to fly about at sunset on still evenings, 

 and the specimens captured are principally males ; the female 

 seems to be very sluggish. First observed on the coast at 

 Ventnor, Isle of Wight, among herbage near the sea, more 

 recently in the boggy portions of heaths in the New Forest) 

 Hants, and in Dorset. It has also been taken at Torquay, 

 Devon, and in Cornwall. So far as is known these four 

 counties form the extent of its range in these Islands. 

 Abroad it is common, and in some places destructive, 

 through Central and Southern Europe, South Sweden, Asia 

 Minor, Persia, Japan, China ; and in North America, in 

 California and Texas. 



