THE CURIOUS BASKET-CARRIERS 



297 



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chrysalides. The male chrysalis works its way out at 

 the lower end of the cocoon, and its shell falls out after 

 the escape of the moth. The female moth never leaves 

 the cocoon she is hardly entitled to the name of moth, 

 being both wingless and legless ; and after having de- 

 posited several hundred eggs within her pupa case, few 

 would recognize in the inconspicuous remnant of her- 

 self which remains any likeness to an insect. 



Few of our common 

 insects have been such 

 a theme for discussion 

 and controversy among 

 naturalists as the bag- 

 worm; and there is much 

 of interest in the life of 

 the insect which it is im- 

 possible to touch upon 

 in this brief paper. 



The basket-carrier *^v^ ? 

 never leaves its case. 

 It carries its house 

 about in its travels, enlarg- 

 ing and decorating it with 

 sticks and leaves as its whim di- 

 rects, and always keeping it safe- 

 ly moored to the branches. A 



collection of the cases from different food trees makes 

 a singular exhibition, for they are thatched with locust, 

 hemlock, spruce, arbor- vitae, or long pine-needles, ac- 

 cording to the plant on which each is found. In the 

 South, we are told, these basket-carriers are looked upon 

 with much superstition by the colored natives, the nat- 

 ure of which is illustrated in the incident narrated by 



