78 LONDON INSECTS 



next year one or two more of the same kind were seen, 

 and the freshness of the country began to leave the 

 conservatory. The following year it was from bad to 

 worse. Human efforts could not stop the mischief, and 

 no little birds were there to come to the rescue ; and in 

 spite of a hecatomb to Dagon some hundred Cater- 

 pillars, all alike, pale underneath, with dark olive-green 

 pencilled backs, thrown into the aquarium for the 

 fishes to fatten upon pet geraniums were demolished, 

 and some twenty feet of rich rank tradescantia, a plant 

 despised in the country, but very precious to London 

 gardeners for its succulent greenness, which can defy 

 even smoke and dirt, stripped almost to bare stalks. 

 Something over two-thirds of the entire length of a 

 Caterpillar is a disproportioned stomach which the 

 owner must work night and day to fill, nipping away 

 for dear life at whatever green thing comes within 

 reach of his ugly vertical jaws. 



The rapid growth of Caterpillars would be incredible if 

 we had not proof. A healthy man takes perhaps thirty 

 years to reach his full growth in height and breadth, 

 and when he has done so weighs probably some twenty 

 times as much as he did when he was born. A Cater- 

 pillar will increase its weight proportionately 500 times 

 as much in thirty days. It is difficult to realise what such 

 figures mean ; we can get a clearer notion by reversing 

 them. Fancy a baby born of ordinary size growing at 

 such a pace as to weigh when a month old as much 

 as six or seven big elephants together! For the 

 father of a family the idea is too appalling to joke about, 



