184 Forty-second Report on the State Museum. [42] 



Limacodes pithecium. Fitch : in Trans. N. Y. St. Agricul. Soc. for 1856, x\*, 



p. 381 ; 3d Eept. (3d-5th) Ins. N. Y., 1859, p. 63, No. 85. 

 Limacodes pithecium. Mokeis: Synop. Lep. N. A., 1862, p. 127. 

 Pfiobetrum pithecium Packard: in Proc. Ent. Soc, Phil., iii, 1864, p. 340; 



Guide Stud. Ins., 1869, p. 290; Ins. Inj.For.-Sh. Trees,— in Bull. No.7, 



U. S. Ent. Commis., 1881, p. 47. 

 Limacodes pithicium. Eiley: in Amer. Entomol., ii, 1870, pp. 25, 340, f. 209; 



5th Eept. Ins. Mo., 1873, p. 126 (stinging power). 

 Fhobeiron pithecium. Lintner : Ent. Contrib. No. Ill — in 26th Eept. N. 



Y. St. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1874, p. 149 (on hazel) ; in Count. Gent., xlvii, 



1882, p. 745 (general notice); id., liii, 1888, p. 725. 

 Phobetron pithecium. Saunders : Ins. Inj. Fruits, 1883, p. 112, f. Ill (habits, 



food-plants, etc.). 

 Phobetronpitheciam. Dimmock, A. K. : in Psyche, 1885^ p. 280 (bibliography). 

 Phobetronpithecium. Hubbard : Ins. Affect. Orange, 1885, p. 142-3, fie:s. 62-3. 



Perhaps the strangest, queerest looking caterpillar that is to be 

 found among all of the known Lepidoptera of the United States, is 

 the one named above as " the hag-moth caterpillar," and (imper- 

 fectly) illustrated in Fig. 11. It never fails to enlist attention and 

 excite curiosity when for the first time its motion attracting the eye 

 shows it to be a living creature; but its wonderful mimicry of bits of 

 dead and curled or eroded leaves is usually the cause of its being 

 passed over without observation. Its peculiar shriveled appearance 

 together with its dark color, is thought by Dr. Harris, to have sug- 

 gested to Sir J. E. Smith, who first described it in the beautiful and 

 costly volumes on the " Barer Lepidopterous Insects of Georgia/' the 

 specific name of pithecium, the meaning of w^hich is a shriveled and 

 monkey-faced old woman. And from the same characters, undoubt- 

 edly, the common name that it bears of the hag-moth caterpillar 

 has been drawn. 



Description of the Caterpillar. 



It belongs to a group of Bombycid caterpillars which, from their 



slug-like form and gliding motion, without apparent feet, are known 



as " slug caterpillars," and scientifically as Cochlidice. Indeed, some 



of the species, but for their bright and often varied 



colors and the broad spines that they bear, would 



.J naturally be mistaken for slugs. Pithecium is 



^^^jg^ about an inch in length, apparently headless as seen 



from above, thick-bodied, of the form shown in the 



figure, of a dark brown color, and clothed with a 



Fig. 11.- The hag- velvet-like down over the low tubercles which the 

 moth caterpillar.PHO" . 

 BETRON PITHECIUM. I'liigs bcar. Projectiug from each side are four 



long, tapering, flattened, curling, velvety appendages, such as might 



suggest a miniature octopus. Of these, the pair near the front, on 



