FAMILY GEOMETRID/H 



"... The sylvan powers 

 Obey our summons ; from their deepest dells 

 The Dryads come, and throw their garlands wild 

 And odorous branches at our feet ; the Nymphs 

 That press with nimble step the mountain-thyme 

 And purple heath-flower come not empty-handed, 

 But scatter round ten thousand forms minute 

 Of velvet moss or lichen, torn from rock 

 Or rifted oak or cavern deep : the Naiads too 

 Quit their loved native stream, from whose smooth face 

 They crop the lily, and each sedge and rush 

 That drinks the rippling tide : the frozen poles, 

 Where peril waits the bold adventurer's tread, 

 The burning sands of Borneo and Cayenne, 

 All, all to us unlock their secret stores 

 And pay their cheerful tribute." 



J. Taylor. Norwich, 1818. 



The Geometridce are a very large and universally distributed 

 family of moths. There is no country where there is any vege- 

 tation where they do not occur. Even in the inhospitable re- 

 gions of the far North, upon the verge of the eternal ice, they may 

 be found. They are more or less frail in their habit, with con- 

 siderable expanse of wing in proportion to the size of the body. 

 They are semidiurnal or crepuscular. They have been character- 

 ized as follows by Sir George F. Hampson: 



"... Proboscis present or rarely absent. Legs and tarsi 

 slender, elongate, and naked, or slightly clothed with hair. Fore 

 wing with vein \a forming a fork with \b. \c absent; vein 5 

 from or from above middle of the discocellulars, 7 rising from 8, 

 9. Hind wing with the frenulum usually present, but absent in 

 a few genera. Vein \a very short, apparently absent in some 

 forms; vein \b running to anal angle; \c absent. 8 with a well- 

 developed precostal spur. 



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