STATES OF INSECTS. (Larva.) 299 
of which it thrust grains of earth so dexterously that 
they projected as far as the outer surface, retained there 
probably by silken lines previously attached and fastened 
within. It then finished its habitation by fortifying the 
inside of the orifice with another layer of earth?. The 
ant-lion (Myrmeleon) spins a globular cocoon with its 
anus, which it covers with grains of sand”. One that I 
took in the forest of Fontainebleau, in the quarry that 
produces the crystallized sandstone called the Fontaine- 
bleau fossil, was covered with large and shining grains. 
Instead of the grains of earth or sand employed by these 
larvee, those of another tribe substitute grains of stone 
detached from the softer walls, upon whose lichens they 
previously feed, which they unite into solid oval cocoons *. 
Those of a fourth, form their cocoons of patches of short 
moss arranged with the roots downwards, and forming 
a vault, as it were, of verdant turf, admirably adapted for 
concealment ¢. The larvee of some moths form their 
cocoons of irregular pieces of bark tied together with 
silk, and resembling when completed a knotty protube- 
rance of the twig on which they are fixed. That of 
Tortrix tuberculana constructs a pannier-shaped one of 
the parenchyma of the leaves of plants °. 
All these cocoons, however, must yield in point of 
singularity of construction, materials, and ingenuity, to 
one formed by a small caterpillar, described by the illus- 
trious naturalist lately quoted, which feeds upon the oak. 
This cocoon is wholly composed of small rectangular 
strap-shaped pieces of the fine upper skin, or epidermis 
4 Reaum. i. 579. > Ibid. vi. 368. © Ibid. i. 542, 
4 Tbid, 543. © Linn. Trans. i. 196. 
