234 LEPIDOPTERA. 



chocolate; undersurfac*^ and sides very conspicuously lemon- 

 yellow from the fourth to the tenth segments ; dorsal line 

 grey, inconspicuous ; above the spiracles is a conspicuous 

 lateral waved velvety black line, edged above at the incisions 

 with whitish blotches ; spiracles white, each in a red blotch ; 

 below them is a series of pale streaks with reddish edges ; 

 back of the twelfth segment transversely marked with black; 

 legs dull red. (C. Fenn.) 



March till the end of May or June, on hazel, oak, birch, 

 beech, hawthorn, fruit trees, and many other deciduous trees; 

 feeding mainly at night, but remaining upon the trees and 

 bushes conspicuously during the day, or, if shaken or dis- 

 turbed, dropping and hanging by a long silken thread, and 

 in some seasons, in Southern districts, becoming so plentiful 

 that the country-women are sometimes obliged to go round 

 considerable distances, by road, on their journeys into and out 

 of the towns, to avoid the annoyance caused in narrow lanes 

 by hundreds of larvae swinging about their heads, or catching 

 upon their clothes. It is not a rare circumstance for the 

 undergrowth in woods to be almost stripped of leaves in May 

 by this, most conspicuously, among other species ; while the 

 denuded branches and twigs ai-e disfigured by the abundance of 

 silken threads and the pellets of excrement entangled in them. 



Pupa elongate, tapering, anal extremity with a doubly 

 hooked bristle ; red-brown or dull red. Subterranean, at a 

 considerable depth ; not in a cocoon. (C. Fenn.) 



The egg is laid in the winter, and hatches in the spring. 



The male hides during the day among dead leaves on the 

 ground, or among those remaining for the winter on the oak 

 bushes, but may occasionally be found at the foot of a wall 

 or of a fence or tree, or upon the trunk, and more frequently 

 on the stem at the bottom of a bush. At dusk it flies rather 

 weakly, and almost immediately settles down to sit upon a 

 bush or the twig of a tree, and may easily be collected with 

 the aid of a lantern. It must, certainly on some nights, fly 



