160 MR. STAINTON ON ORGYIA. 
reduced to a shrivelled morsel of dried and scarcely animated skin, 
drops out of the case and dies.”’ 
Having now gone through the various genera of the Psychide, 
I return to the genus Orgyia. The abnormal habit of the females 
which I have thought it would be interesting to bring under the 
notice of this Society is this :— 
In many species of the genus Orgyia the female has ill-developed 
legs and antenne, and never quits the cocoon. 
This statement rests on a series of distinct observations made on 
different species by various entomologists; and it is not till we 
collate these recorded observations that we perceive how general is 
this peculiar habit. 
Oreyia RupESTRIS. In the ‘Annales de la Société Entomo- 
logique de France,’ tome i. (published in 1882), we find, at p. 275, a 
description of this species by Rambur, in a List of Corsican Lepi- 
doptera, with descriptions of some new species. He thus notices 
the female :— 
“The female is nearly apterous, its wings being reduced to two 
very minute velvety scales. The whole body is covered with whitish 
down ; it is little more than a bag quite filled with eggs. The parts 
of the chrysalis-skin almost always remain on the head and the 
neighbouring parts of the body. 
“This female, whose existence is confined to the single act of 
reproduction, does not come out of its cocoon, from which it 
protrudes its anus so that the male may copulate with it. That 
done, it fills its cocoon with its eggs intermixed with down, and 
covers the entire mass with a strong bed of down. After the eggs 
are deposited, one can scarcely find the remains of the body. The 
Count de Saporta has observed similar manners in Orgyia Trigo- 
tephras, in the neighbourhood of Aix.’ These observations of 
the Count de Saporta, though made previously to those of Dr. 
Rambur, were published two years later. 
Oreyia TrigorEepHras. A notice of this species, by the Count 
de Saporta, appears in the 3rd volume of the ‘ Annales de la Société 
Entomologique de France,’ p.183, published in1834. After noticing 
that the male perfect insect comes out of its cocoon like all other 
Lepidoptera, he observes :— 
“Tt is not so with the female, which is covered with a white 
down, and is entirely destitute of wings;’ “ses antennes, trés- 
courtes, ne sont point visibles’’ (a sentence I find difficulty in 
translating) ; “and its legs even are so short that they can be of 
