286 LEPIDOPTERA. 



margins a little darker ; cilia smoky-white. Female similar 

 but a little darker. 



Underside of the fore wings light olive-brown, with fine 

 white costal dots. Hind wings smoky white, stippled with 

 slender brown cross lines in front. 



On the wing from June till August. 



Larva short and stumpy, thickest in the middle, mode- 

 rately active, very restless and impatient of confinement ; 

 pale pink, more whitish beneath ; internal dorsal vessel 

 visible ; head light brown ; jaws black ; dorsal plate pale 

 yellow, with a line of four dots across it ; anal plate light 

 brown. 



July, August, and September ; in the flower and seed heads 

 of Pio'is hiemcioides, eating out the green seeds, and when 

 a seed-head is exhausted removing to another, yet without 

 leaving any very obvious traces of its removal. When full 

 fed, which quickly occurs, leaving the seed-head to spin a 

 tough cocoon elsewhere, iu which it remains unchanged 

 through the winter, and until the following May. The 

 names of other composite plants have been given as its 

 food, but I think usually under a misapprehension, yet 

 Mr. A. Thurnall has reared it from the allied Helminthia 

 echioides. 



Pupa apparently uudescribed. 



An exceedingly pretty but rather a sluggish species, 

 hiding among its food-plant and other herbage during the 

 day and then unwilling to fly ; also choosing a sheltered 

 spot to hide in. At sunset, however, it is lively enough and 

 flies about freely. Partial to rough, hilly, and rocky ground 

 on chalk, and limestone, hills, and quarries, but decidedly 

 local. To be found in Kent, Sussex, Surrey, Isle of VVight, 

 Dorset, Somerset, Essex, Cambs, Gloucestershire, Hereford- 

 shire, Leicestershire, Cheshire, and Yorkshire, though in 

 very restricted localities. In Wales, common in some quarries 



