REPORT OF THE SOCIETY 99 



as the Goat Moths, the I-eopard Moths, and the Carpenter Moths. The popular 

 term Carpenter Worm h8,s been applied particularly to the members of the 

 genus Prionoxystus because of the very large, aligar-like borings that these 

 larvae make in the wood. 



The genus Prionoxystus is a small but important one containin^^ only 

 two species, robiniae and mac7?iurtreu It has been known bj- other names, such 

 as Xijleutes, Cossus, etc. That of Xyleutes, signifying carpenter, as preposed 

 by Hubner, was certainly a fitting one for the boring larvae. The word Cossus 

 has an interesting historic association. It is derived from the Latin form 

 C0S5WS meaning "a worm bred in wood".(l) According to Pliny, the historian who 

 was a close student of many branches of natural science, the ancient Romans 

 popularly applied the term cossus to an oak borer which they were accustomed 

 to rear for the purpose of food, it being considered by them a highly palatable 

 dish. In the course of his "Natural History" which is an encyclopedic account 

 of the knowledge of his times, Vol. 1, Book 17, Chap. 37, Sec. 4, p. 643, he whites 

 as follows: "Certain trees are infested with worms to a greater or less extent, 

 almost all indeed. And this fact birds test out by the sound of the hollowness of 

 the bark. Indeed nowadays they are beginning to be sought after and the espe- 

 cially large ones from oaks are esteemed a delicacy. They are called cossi and 

 are actually fattened up specially with meal." In another place, Vol. 11, Book 

 30; Chap. 39, Sec. 3, p. 341, Pliny further records the fact that the Romans also 

 used these borers medicially. This is what he says: "The cossi which are 

 engendered in wood heal aU ulcers; they are burnt with an equal weight of 

 anise and daubed on with oil." It is most likely, however, that the word cossus 

 was employed for the first time in scientific literature by Linnaeus in describing 

 the European Goat Moth in 1758, which he named Bombijx cossus. . Fabricius, 

 at a later date, 1794, when describing the insect gave it the name ligniperda, 

 wood destroyer; and created a new genus on which he bestowed the name 

 Cossus. In this genus WMcmurtrei was placed by Guerin in 1829 when he origin- 

 ally figured the lesser-oak carpenter moth. Kirby in his "Catalogue of Lepidop- 

 tera" 1892, put it in the geni;s Trypanus, while Neumaegen and Dyer in their 

 "Preliminarj- Revision of the Bombyces" in 1894 arranged it under the genus 

 Prionoxystus which Grote had established in 1882. When Fitch was studying 

 the same insect in 1859 he called it querciperda and classified it under the genus 

 Cossus. Lintner did the same in 1878. Grote in his new Check List 1882 accept- 

 ed Fitch's querciperda but placed the species under Prio7ioxystus. Barnes and 

 McDunnough in their "Contributions to the Lepidoptera of North America" 

 have classified it under Prionoxystus macmurtrei the same as Neumaegen and 

 Dyer. This name is now accepted as the correct one, the others having passed 

 automatically into synonomj^ 



DESCRIPTION OF THE INSECT.— THE ADULT 



The female moth is 32 mm. long and 10 mm. at widest part of thorax; with 

 wing expanse of 60mm. It has a spindle-shaped body, rather thinly covered 

 with darkish grey scales and of that peculiar combination of shades known as 

 "pepper and salt". On the mottled fore wings appear black lines running across 

 the principal veins nearly at right angles, while the hind wings are clear, except 

 for a shaded area nearest the body. The head, which is somewhat prominent, 



(l) See Ainsworth's English-Latin diclionary 1840 p. 124). 



