NO LID ^. 193 



until nearly closed in; the larva then enters the cocoon, draws 

 over the top or headpiece, and lines the interior with silk." 

 The operation, so carefully described, is of peculiar interest 

 from the unusual method adopted of incparincj the cocoon 

 before entering, and then closing it up. 



The moth is very sluggish, and hides in the day time 

 among herbage close to the ground. At dusk it runs up the 

 grasses and sits about upon the short herbage, but flies later 

 at night, and has been taken by means of a strong light. It 

 was first discovered in this country in 1858, when a specimen 

 was taken at Bembridge in the Isle of Wight. In 1879 it 

 was found in a very restricted locality on the sandhills at Deal 

 on the coast of Kent, and from females then taken eggs were 

 obtained. From these, and from the results of further cap- 

 tures in the same place, the large majority of the specimens 

 in our collections were supplied ; but a few more examples 

 have been secured in the Isle of Wight, at Folkestone, Kent, 

 and on the cliffs on the coast of Sussex, near Hastings. I 

 know of no localities, with us, outside these three counties. 

 Abroad it is a very widely distributed and sometimes abundant 

 species, found in Central and Southern Italy, Corsica, Livonia, 

 Finland, Austria, Hungary, Saxony, and rarely in Eastern 

 France ; also in Armenia, Tartary, Siberia and elsewhere in 

 the North and East of Asia. 



5. N. albulalis. Hah. ; albula. Stand. Cat. — Expanse, I 

 inch. Fore wings broad with raised tufts of light brown scales, 

 and a broad central pale brown band ; hind wings pale grey. 



Antenufe rather slender, but with distinct, solid, regularly 

 ciliated pectinations of a brown colour, in the male ; in the 

 female simple ; shaft, in both sexes, white, base clothed with 

 snow-white scales ; palpi long, pure white ; head and thorax 

 white ; the top of the head with a flattened mass of white 

 scales between the antennae ; abdomen brownish-white. Fore 

 wings broad, with margins gently curved, apex squared, hind 

 margin not very oblique, white, clouded with pale brown, 



VOL. II. If 



