

INSECTA TRANSVAALIENSIA. 49 



Order LEPIDOPTERA. 

 Suborder HETEROCERA. 



In describing the Heterocera, or Moths, no special classification will be here followed, 

 beyond treating the different families separate and complete. This is the more necessary 

 as the heteroceral taxonomy is now being much studied, and its treatment receiving 

 somewhat diverse suggestions from the pens of different lepidopterists. Of course the latest 

 classificatory propositions are to be found in Sir Gr. Hampson's colossal publication now 

 appearmg in almost annual volumes,* and which must, from its universal treatment, become 

 a standard authority. Besides this reason, another exists for the treatment of separate and 

 not always closely allied families, in the accessibility of sufficient material to render the 

 sections moderately complete. We now enumerate genera and species of some famiUes 

 which from their larger size and prominent appearance have been most frequently observed 

 and more thoroughly collected. The more obscure and smaller Moths will be dealt with 

 subsequently, a course warranted by the additions now being made to our knowledge by quite 

 a number of good and energetic friends and collectors in the Transvaal. 



We have first to deal with a phalanx of large African Moths which have been usually 

 included in one family— Saturniidaj ; but their life-histories being now better recorded, they 

 are seen to fall into two very distinct divisions or subfamilies. The principal character that 

 divides them is to be found in the method of their transformations, one section spinning a 

 cocoon, the other section pupating beneath the surface of the ground. Other divisional 

 characters are also to be found in the perfect insects, but the pupal arrangements are here 

 considered fundamental. It may be well to review the work of different entomologists who 

 have enabled us by a study of their propositions to more or less adopt their views, and to 

 arrive at what seems a fairly natural arrangement. 



The first concise information, or at all events the first published facts with which I am 

 acquainted, relative to the pupation of many of these Moths are attached to the name of the 

 late Philip Crowley, who, in answer to inquiries, received the following information from a 

 Natal correspondent:— "The larvfe of all our big Moths burrow into the soil to a depth of two 

 or three inches, and there they remain, some for six months, some for ten. The way in 

 which I manage is this : first I search in due season for the caterpillars, which, having found, 

 I remove to bushes and trees as near my residence as possible. I then watch them carefully 

 day by day, until I consider them large enough to remove into my breeding-cages, all of 

 which have at least six inches of good soil at the bottom. When full-fed they burrow, as I 

 have said before, and exactly six weeks after the disappearance of the last one, I dig up all 

 the pupffi and lay them carefully side by side upon moss, which is from time to time 

 moistened." Mr. Crowley said he had received from this source the following pupas, which, 



■■'= ' Catalogue of the Lepidoptera Phalanae in the British Museum,' vols, i.-iii. published. 

 March 10, 1903. « 



