DORSET LEPIUOPTERA IN 1892-3. 67 



breeding of the moth. I regret to be obliged to -withhohl its name, 

 but such is the rapacity of some collectors, who make a business of 

 dealing in insects, especially moths, that the species might be 

 exterminated from the locality were it known — an energetic 

 collector might make great havoc in even a day. 



The first time that I saw the larva was in 1889, when a captured 

 female laid four eggs in two pairs, those of each pair being fastened 

 together in the way of a cottage loaf. This was a most unusual 

 circumstance, which I have not before observed in any moth ; but 

 it was either accidental or an individual peculiarity, as it has not 

 again occurred, though I have seen a good many more eggs. Tho 

 egg is oval, flattened, beautifully iridescent, and covered with very 

 minute holes and small wavy ridges, enclosing numerous little spaces 

 with from three to six sides each. The little larvte duly hatched, but 

 I knew not on what to feed them, and after trying many plants I 

 got them to settle down quietly on a thistle floret near the seed at 

 the bottom. Xow it is not at all the custom of caterpillars to seem 

 contented with food that they cannot eat, and they generally 

 wander about restlessly until they find some more to their taste ; 

 so that I naturally assumed that thistle was the food plant. But 

 my pleasure was short-lived, as they all died in a few days, 

 and I had to satisfy myself with taking a description of them, and 

 meditating on their amiable dispositions. I found afterwards that 

 the larva does not live in flower heads at all, but from its earliest 

 days spins a sort of nest round itself in a shoot of its food plant, 

 and after a time, when this nest attains some size, lives in a silken 

 tube in the middle of it, coming out at night to feed upon the 

 leaves. In the autumn it thickens the middle portion of this 

 tube, and there passes the winter. In the spring it seeks fresh 

 food and constructs another nest. About May it closes up the 

 ends of its silk tube, forming a rather strong cocoon, turns to a 

 pupa, and emerges in June or July. This year, owing to the 

 abnormally early season, there was a second brood of this moth, 

 as well as of many others, which I proved by breeding a si)ccimen 

 on September 26th from an egg laid in the early summer. I do 



