LEPIDOPTERA. LARV^. 281 



one another) ? Again, what is this large pale blotch on 

 the leaf of a wild plum or sloe ? Both surfaces seem 

 sound ; but he holds it to the light, and finds all the 

 green substance gone from within. An elm-tree over- 

 hangs : what is this dark zigzag track ? what this pretty 

 little pink stain on the sorrel at our feet ? What these 

 puckered lines on a hundred blades of grass ? Why is 

 half this hawthorn leaf brown, and dry, and thin ? Does 

 not the irregular line of black granules between the 

 cuticles tell of the passage of a creature feeding, digest- 

 ing, rejecting ? Enter the garden and look up ; the 

 drooping branches of laburnum show a hundred pale 

 patches marked like an oyster-shell in concentric lines, 

 and fortunate is the looker-on if the author of this 

 disfigurement is present, or rather, not the author, a 

 Caterpillar, but the beautiful creature developed from 

 that little grub (PI. XL, fig. 4). 



Not all mined-leaves, however, have been the homes 

 of tiny Moth-larvae. On the leaves of buttercups, 

 primroses, holly, honeysuckle, and many others, are 

 found mines made by various species of two-winged 

 Flies ; and here, again, minute observation is necessary. 

 One means of distinguishing the Lepidopterous from 

 the Dipterous mines is afforded by the manner in which 

 the usually black, granular, excrementitious matter is 

 deposited, forming " a continuous track" in the mines 

 of the Lepidoptera, while in the mines of the Diptera it 

 is scattered irregularly. "In the blotch mine of the 

 sloe, the work of a Lepidopterous larva,* this matter is 



* The writer finds the rules concerning the Lepidoptera mines in a MS. 

 note taken from the "Zoologist," aud with no authority affixed. 



