92 



The brown form is similar to the green in its markings, the pale 

 stripes being pale purplish-browii, the dark stripes a darker shade 

 of brown. The dorsal space is marked with the same number of 

 whitish lines, but they are carneous-white instead of greenish-white, 

 with mottlings of the same on the side where the green form is 

 mottled. Stigmatal stripe pale-yellow, a little mottled with purplish, 

 and the lower edge whitish ; stigmata circled with white outside the 

 black. The pile is the same as in the green form. The piliferous 

 spots above the stigmate are circled with brown, the hairs gray. 



Previous to the last moult the body is paler, but the prominent 

 black piliferous spots, jaws, feet, cervical shield and anal plate 

 make it appear darker. I have no notes upon the intermediate 

 stages from the egg to the full-grown larva, and shall have to pass 

 over that. 



"The newly-hatched Boll-worm," says Professor Comstock, "walks 

 like a geometric larva or looper, 'a measuring worm,' as it is often 

 called. This is easily explained by the fact that, while in the full- 

 grown worm the abdominal legs or pro-legs are all nearly equal in 

 length, in the newly-hatched worm the second pair is slightly 

 shorter than the third, and the first pair is shorter and slenderer 

 than the second, a state of things approaching that in the full- 

 grown Cotton-worm, though the difference in size in the former case 

 is not nearly so marked as in the latter. This method of walking 

 the worm loses with its first or second moult." 



He further says, in speaking of the habits of the larva as a 

 Cotton or Boll- worm : 



"When hatched from an egg which has been deposited upon a 

 leaf, they invariably made their first meal on the substance of the* 

 leaf, and then wandered about for a longer or shorter space of time, 

 evidently seeking a boll or flower bud. It was always interesting to 

 watch this seemingly aimless search, the young worm crawling first 

 down the leaf stem and then back, then dropping a few inches by 

 a silken thread, and then painfully working its way back again, 

 until at last it found its boll or bud, or fell to the ground, where it 

 was destroyed by ants." 



Aside from the seeming almost omniverous habit of this larva as 

 regards plants, there are numerous well authenticated accounts of 

 the larger ones devouring smaller ones, and also of eating into the 

 chrysalids of the Cotton- worm {Aletea). Mr. Frelease, as reported 

 by Professor Comstock, states that on several occasions he saw 

 large Boll-worms catch and devour smaller ones, while in other 

 instances they would bite them until the juice would flow, when 

 they would suck this out and reject the rest. Upon finding dead 

 worms in their burrows beneath the husks in ears of corn, I was at 

 first inclined to the opinion that they died from lack of proper 

 food, the kernels having become hard ; but further observation 

 showed that they were bitten by others occupying the same ear. 

 Upon taking full-grown worms in the hand, I have noticed that 

 they give themselves little concern about trying to get away, but 

 generally try to bite the hand, as though it mattered little to them 

 what they ate. 



