GEOMETERS. 



189 



the fore wings a remarkably beautiful and 

 tesselated character. I fail to discover a 

 discoidal spot. The hind wings are dingy 

 brown, with two transverse whitish lines, the 

 first slightly waved, the second scalloped. 



The MOTH appears on the wing in July, and 

 has been taken, but not frequently, in the 

 lake districts of England. It is not reported 

 from Scotland or Ireland. (The scientific 

 name is Cidaria reticulata.) 



359. The Small Phoenix Moth (Cidaria silaceata) . 



359. THE SMALL PHOENIX MOTH. The 

 palpi are short and very sharp-pointed ; the 

 antennae are nearly simple in both sexes; the 

 fore wings are scarcely pointed at the tip ; 

 their colour is brown of two shades, intersected 

 and divided by very pale lines; the dark brown 



is comprised in a basal blotch, a median band, 

 a transverse series of conical spots, and three 

 or four hind-marginal blotches, the upper- 

 most of which is the largest ; the hind wings 

 are pale gray -brown ; the head, body, and 

 legs are brown. The size, form, and direction 

 of the markings are so various as to require 

 a series of figures. T am indebted to Mr. 

 Doubleday and Mr. Bond for the loan of the 

 remarkable varieties figured. 



The CATERPILLAR, when full-grown, gene- 

 rally rests in a straight position, except that 

 the feet are occasionally attached to the stem 

 of the food-plant, and then the anterior part 

 of the body that is, the head, together with 

 the second, third, and fourth segments bent 

 at a right angle with the remainder of the 

 body, the third pair of legs forming the apex 

 of the angle ; when disturbed, the legs are de- 

 tached from the food, and the body bends and 

 oscillates backwards and forwards as long as 

 the disturbance continues. The head, after 

 the manner of many other Geometers, is flat- 

 tened and porrected, and of equal diameter 

 with the body : the body is long, slender, uni- 

 formly cylindrical, without tubercles, having 

 distributed very sparingly over its surface 

 short scattered hairs, which are very slender 

 and inconspicuous, except under a lens. The 

 colour of the head is pale whitish green, the 

 face variously marked with clear brown, which 

 colour is sometimes confined to the sides, 

 sometimes pervades nearly the whole face ; 

 the body is delicately green, with a median 

 series of brown dots, one of which is seated 

 on the skin-fold, between the segments ; the 

 belly has a median and narrow but conspi- 

 cuous white stripe ; the first and second pair 

 of legs whitish green, delicately tinged with 

 brown; the third pair is brown, the colour 

 continued on the belly to a length about equal 

 to that of the legs themselves ; the ventral 

 claspers are pale green, with an exterior tinge 

 of brown; the anal claspers have a double 

 lateral oblique stripe pointing towards the 

 back ; the anterior half of this stripe is white, 

 the posterior half purple-brown. I found this 

 caterpillar in a garden at Leominster, feeding 

 on enchanter's night-shade (Circoea lutetiana), 



