178 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
spring, emerging about April 20th, 2. e., after March winds have 
subsided, and more genial and warmer weather has set in, and 
the young blades of various grasses have attained some little 
height above ground. On the 8th of August, 1891, at Leigh, I 
noticed that the female butterflies were in excess of the males, 
and that beyond assembling on the heads of thistle and other 
plants, then in flower, they appeared anxious only to fly amongst 
the low-growing grass, and more particularly along the edge of 
the inland ditches, which are a feature of this and other parts of 
the Essex coast. Here, then, I presume, the eggs are laid, and 
although at different times I have noticed the perfect insects in 
copulé, I have not, up to the present, been able to detect the 
female in the act of ovipositing; but by those captured and con- 
fined in the glass jar, with grass (Triticum) from the locality, eggs 
were very freely Jaid in the two seasons of 1890 and 1891. Ishould 
say, from observation, that each female is capable of depositing 
at least from thirty to forty eggs, these being, for the size of the 
insect, rather large, and in confinement laid in a row or rows in 
the sheath formed by the culm and main stem of the blade. From 
these and the sources above mentioned I append the following 
description. 
The egg—which may be described as a rounded oblong and 
flat, i.¢., like a bean—is of a pale straw colour when first laid, 
the shell throughout, and even after the larva emerges, shining 
very much like mother-of-pearl. After about eight days the 
colour changes from pale straw to a deep yellow, and from that, 
in about three weeks, or about a month after being laid, to a dark 
leaden hue, and the young larva becomes plainly visible coiled on 
one side, the head being placed at one of the shorter sides. In 
this embryo state the larva remains all the winter, securely 
attached to the interior of a culm of a dry and stiff species of 
grass of the genus Triticum, common on sea-walls, and in this 
hidden position defies the mouths of straying horses and cattle 
(the grass being probably too coarse at this season for their 
consumption), and also the coldest of winters and heaviest of 
inundations, if at all subjected to these last, by reason of the 
stoutness and closeness of the texture of the egg-shell. In this 
respect the chief enemy to the species at this stage would seem 
to be the practice of burning the old grass in early spring, when, 
of course, the ova would perish, and the insect as a consequence 
appear in diminished numbers the following summer. About 
April 20th, judging from the last two seasons, the larva begins to 
awaken and moves slowly in the shell, and presently, piercing a 
hole, emerges, leaving behind a curiously-frayed opening, which 
gives evidence of the substantial character of the shell. So far as 
I have observed, the young larva does not eat the egg-shell, but 
immediately wanders in an upward direction, doubtless searching 
for the tender blades of grass. On emerging the larva is, in 
