158 NATURE STUDY. 



water-lilies ; and each kind of caterpillar changes at length 

 into its own particular species of moth or butterfly. 



So a lifetime is not long enough in which to learn about 

 them all, but there are certain groups that are so distinct 

 or so common that they can be easily recognized, even by 

 the children, with a little assistance, and these may form 

 the beginnings of a collection. For example, the Prome- 

 thea moth is the most common of the Giant Silk-worm 

 family, or Saturniidge. Its cocoons are often found in win- 

 ter, rolled up in a leaf and hanging to the slender branches 

 of small wild cherr^^-trees. I know many boys and girls, 

 and not a few men and women who were boys and girls 

 once, who will often go clambering and frolicking through 

 deep snow to some bush or tree of the wild cherry or ash, 

 " just to see." When found, these cocoons can be taken 

 home, still attached to the twigs, and in the spring or ear- 

 ly summer there will emerge from each a beautiful red- 

 dish-brown moth, which has been named Callosamia pro- 

 methea. 



Another moth of this family, and the largest of the 

 Giant Silk- worms, is the Cecropia. This expands from 

 five to six inches, and is dusky brown in color, with a 

 band of white across the wings and a broad outer margin 

 of red. The cocoon, which is two or three inches long, 

 and made of coarsely woven silk, is found on many kinds 

 of forest trees, but instead of hanging perpendicularly, 

 like the cocoon of Promethea, it is fastened for its entire 

 length longitudinally to a twig. 



Still another member of this family is the lyUna moth, 

 the female of which has bright green wings, with long 

 extensions or " tails " at the extremities of the hind ones. 

 This is Tropcca haia, and is known to almost everyone in 

 the country because of its size and peculiar form. 



A very few of these three kinds of moths will fill a large 

 box, which should be labeled Satuniiidse, and any boy or 



