212 LEPIDOPTERA. 



or the whole wing is tinged with pale yellow. Mrs. Bazett 

 has a specimen, taken at Reading, Berks, of which the ground 

 colour is uniform smoky pale brown, without a tinge of white, 

 the dark markings visible, but obscured by the general 

 smoky-black clouding. On the other hand, Mr. F. N. Pierce 

 has a fine white specimen in which the markings are only 

 most slenderly indicated. But the most remarkable aberra- 

 tion known to me in this, or almost in any species, is a 

 specimen in the collection of Mr. S. J. Capper, in which the 

 fore wings and right hind wing are normal, but the left hind 

 wing has a wonderful reproduction of markings of the fore 

 wing, as though they had been printed on it in reverse, the 

 angulated black lines and the white intermediate spaces 

 being very distinctly and wonderfully shown. 

 On the wing in July and August. 



Larva short and stout, rather even in thickness, a little 

 flattened above and beneath ; head rounded, shining black ; 

 dorsal region of the body down to the subdorsal lines occupied 

 by a broad orange-red stripe in which the dorsal line is 

 represented by a series of heart-shaped or bottle-shaped 

 black spots ; subdorsal stripes black or formed of short black 

 streaks ; remainder of the body bluish-slate colour ; spira- 

 cular lines indicated by a slender black thread, or by a fine 

 white line, or even two ; raised dots black and glistening ; 

 spiracles black ; legs slate-colour or more faintly greenish. 



August to May on Lecidea confluens, " a crustaceous lichen 

 which dots over old walls with its cracked and weather- 

 beaten patches," also other minute lichens which grow upon 

 walls. The observations of Mr. P. Inchbald, made forty 

 years ago, are worth reproducing : " We have a colony that 

 have fixed their quarters on the house side. During the day 

 they carefully secrete themselves in their sand nests ; as they 

 take care to make up the doorway on entering their retreats 

 there is no chance of catching a glimpse of them then. The 

 early morning is their time of feeding ; then old and young 



