38 Mr. E. B. Poulton's notes upon the colours 



which showed some interesting facts in connection with 

 the oblique stripes. In the first place the tendency 

 towards the repetition of markings in segmented animals 

 had shown itself in the appearance of a slight oblique 

 stripe on the 12th segment. This was very nearly 

 parallel with the others, and consisted of an interrupted 

 purple line, with the white stripe only indicated by a 

 few isolated points at the lower end of the purple line 

 (see fig. 7). This imperfect repetition of the oblique 

 stripes occurred on both right and left sides, but without 

 complete symmetry. 



Another interesting fact was that the purple borders of 

 the seven usual stripes became darker at about the 

 middle, and this gradually increased until the lower end 

 was very nearly black. The dark colour was repeated 

 on the other side of the white stripe as an irregular 

 patch opposite to the inferior end of the purple border. 

 The darkening of the border began at the anterior edge 

 and gradually extended posteriorly until in the lower 

 quarter of the purple stripe it had afi'ected its whole 

 thickness (see fig. 7, in which the darkening is not 

 sufficiently indicated). The dark patch behind the lower 

 end of the white stripe was almost or completely hidden 

 when the segments were at all contracted. 



Pkotective attitudes in the Larv^ of GeOMETEjE. — 

 During the present year (1883) I have reared from the 

 egg, larvae of the three less-known species of Epliyridce, 

 Ephyra pendularia, E. orhicularia, and E. omicronaria. 

 Although the perfect insects are well known, I infer that 

 the larvse are seldom seen, from the meagre descriptions 

 in text-books, and from the fact that the food-plants are 

 quoted from Guenee by both Stainton and Newman. My 

 object was to experiment upon the pupae in order to 

 investigate the causes of seasonal dimori:)hism in this 

 group of moths, using Prof. Weismann's methods (see 

 the translation of his book on this subject by Meldola). 

 I therefore directed no especial attention to the larvse, 

 being very busy with other work at the time ; but upon 

 one occasion I found the larvae of E. pendularia assum- 

 ing a remarkable spiral attitude which I had never 

 before observed. This caused me to observe more closely, 

 and ultimately led to the following notes. 



The larvae of Geometrce are especially j)rotected, as is 

 well known, by their resemblance to twigs and thorns 

 which stand out straight from a stem, generally making 



