ON ENTOMOLOGY. 15 



detached for the purpose from what had been given it as food ; the largest 

 piece of wood had been employed as a substantial covering, and protec- 

 tion for the whole. It remained in this retreat motionless and without 

 food, till revived by the warmth of the ensuing spring; when it gnawed 

 its way out, and began to eat voraciously to make up for its long fast. 

 These Caterpillars are three years in arriving at their final change into the 

 winged state ; but as the one just mentioned was nearly full grown, it 

 began in the month of May to prepare a cell in which it might undergo 

 its metamorphosis. Whether it had actually improved its skill in architec- 

 ture by its previous experience, we will not undertake to say, but its 

 second cell was greatly superior to the first. In the first, there was only 

 one large piece of wood employed ; in the second, two pieces were 

 plured in such a manner as to support each other, and beneath the angle 

 thus formed an oblong structure, was made, composed as before of wood 

 raspings and silk, but much stronger in texture than the winter cell, 

 In a few weeks (four if we recollect aright), the Moth came forth." 



iUrture. 



The CLOTHES MOTH (Tinea Destructor). The mother insect takes 

 care to deposit her eggs on or near such substances, as she instinctively 

 foreknows will be best adapted for the food of the young, taking care to 

 distribute them so that there may be a plentiful supply, and enough 

 room for each, for example some of the Caterpillars feed upon the shreds 

 of cloth used in training wall fruit trees ; but there is never found more 

 than two on the same shred. This scattering of the eggs in many 

 places, renders the effects of the Caterpillars more injurious, from their 

 attacking many parts of a garment, or a piece of stuff at the same time. 

 When one of the Caterpillars of this family issues from the egg, its 

 first care is to provide itself with a domicile, which indeed seems no 

 less indispensible than food, for, like all Caterpillars that feed under 

 cover, it will not eat while it remains unprotected. Its mode of build- 

 ing is very similar to that which is employed by other Caterpillars, that 

 make use of extraneous materials. The foundation or frame work is 

 made of silk secreted by itself, and into this it interweaves portions of 

 the materials upon which it feeds. We have repeatedly witnessed (says 

 Rennie), the proceedings of these insects from the very foundation of 

 their structure, and at the moment of writing this, we turned out one 

 from- the carcase of an Old Lady Moth (Mormo Maura) in our cabinet, 

 and placed it on a desk covered with green cloth, where it found 

 materials to construct another dwelling. It wandered about for half a 

 day before it began its operations ; but it did not, as asserted by Bonnet, 

 Kirby, and Spence, in moving from place to place, seem to be as 

 much incommoded by the lojng hairs which surrounded it, as we are by 

 walking amongst high grass ; nor accordingly, marching scythe in hnnd, 



