l88 LEPIDOPTERA. 



on the crown of each lobe, all with black bristly hairs. On 

 the back of the second segment is a narrow raised semi- 

 circular plate of greyish flesh colour, also set with bristles. 

 Oil Mdampijrwm pratensc. (Buckler.) 



August and September and after hybernation — which 

 takes place in colonies in a common web at the base of the 

 food-plants — in April and May. Mr. G. C. Bignell says that 

 it eats also Veronica chamcedrys and Plantago lanccolata, where 

 they grow in recently cleared woodland, and loves to feed in 

 the sunshine. Mr. South has found it upon Digitalis 

 purpurea (Foxglove), and Mr. Harwood on Tcucrium scorodonia 

 as well as Digitalis. 



Pupa very plump and rounded, wing-sheaths prominent ; 

 thorax broad ; a hollow between it and the abdomen, the 

 segments of which last bear little rounded eminences ; tip of 

 the abdomen bent back almost to a right angle. Of a 

 whitish colour, and texture like biscuit china, wing-sheaths 

 browner, and having, with the eye and leg-sheaths, strong 

 black streaks and dashes ; on the back of the abdomen every 

 segment has a transverse, orange-brown bar, with black 

 spots ; or a black bar with orange spots. (Buckler.) Probably 

 suspended to its food plant. 



The habits of this species are somewhat peculiar ; it is 

 excessively local, occurring in abundance in some woods, 

 while not a specimen is to be found in others in the im- 

 mediate neighbourhood, and apparently under precisely 

 similar conditions. Even in the woods which it frequents it 

 is said never to be found in any abundance, in the same spot, 

 for two successive seasons. Open spaces, especially those 

 which have been recently cleared of timber, or from which 

 the undergrowth has recently — within two or three years — 

 been cut, are those most especially favoured. Mr. H. Goss 

 says : " I have never found it in the same spot for two follow- 

 ing years. Its metropolis is changed eveiy year. When 

 caught it sometimes, but by no means invariably, feigns 



