THE OLEANDER HAWK-MOTH. 47 



in England is that of Stephens in 1835. He wrote : "A noble 

 specimen of this remarkably beautiful insect (five inches three 

 lines in expanse), was taken in the beginning of September, 

 ^^d3:i by a lady in her drawing-room at Dover. Whether the 

 pupa had been imported in some of the numerous packages of 

 foreign fruits, etc., or the insect itself had been brought over 

 in one of the passage-vessels, is a question not easily solved. 

 The larva feeds upon an exotic plant ; but has been found 

 in a garden near Charmouth, as appears by a subsequent 

 communication to the £;it. Mas^asme by Captain Blomer." 



The next record of the moth appears in the Zoologist for 

 1852. "On the nth of September a specimen of Chccrocafiipa 

 nernwiis taken in Montpelier Road, Brighton, by a young gentle- 

 man at school, while it was hovering over a passion flower." 

 Two caterpillars were found in a garden at Eastbourne, feeding 

 upon the leaves of potato, in October, 1859. In confinement 

 they ate periwinkle, but they were not reared. The following 

 records are, except where otherwise stated, of single specimens 

 of the moth : Hastings, August 2, 1862 ; Sheffield, September 

 14, 1867 ; St. Leonards, October, 1868 (.'* 2 examples) ; Ascot, 

 June, 1873 ; Lewes, September 3, 1874 ; Hemel Hempstead, 

 October 15, 1876; Tottenham, Middlesex, Eastbourne, Sussex, 

 and Blandford, Dorset, September, 1884; Hartlepool and 

 Prestwich, July, 1885; Brighton, September 7, 1886; Poplar, 

 September 20, 1888 ; Dartmouth, September 26, 1890 ; Stowling, 

 Kent, July, 1896 ; Yalding, Kent, September 18, Teignmouth, 

 October 23, 1900; Banhead, Scotland, end September, 1901 ; 

 Liverpool, in a steamship, and Atherstone, Warwickshire, 

 October, 1903 ; Eastbourne, July 14, 1904 ; Lancaster, Sep- 

 tember 18, 1906. A specimen of DapJinis hypothons^ Cramer, 

 a native of India, Borneo, Java, and Ceylon, was captured at 

 Crieff, Perthshire, in July, 1873, a-^^d was recorded as D. ncrii, 

 and the error was not rectified until 1891. 



It will be seen from the above that the moth is exceedingly 



