200 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 



the manner of Notolophus antiquus, and the females are 

 almost equally abundant and conspicuous at rest. It has also 

 lately been introduced into North America, where it has 

 proved quite as destructive. Very fine and large specimens 

 used to be common in the fens of Cambridgeshire and 

 Huntingdonshire before they were drained ; but otherwise 

 the Moth seems to have always been rare in England. Some 

 of the writers of the last century say that it was intro- 

 duced into the orchards at Chiswick, where, however, it soon 

 seems to have died out ; Stephens says that it has occasionally 

 been taken at Coombe Wood ; and Stainton mentions Halton 

 in Buckinghamshire, and Stowmarket as localities. It is now 

 considered to be almost, if not quite, extinct as a British 

 insect, though a degenerate breed derived from an original 

 British stock is, or was till recently, kept up among entomo- 

 logists. It is curious that two British species, both named 

 dispar from the dissimilarity of the sexes, one a Butter- 

 fly and the other a Moth, should both have become practi- 

 cally extinct in England through the draining of the fens. 



GENUS LYMANTRIA. 

 Lymantria, Hiibner, Verz. bek. Schmett. p. 160 (1822?); 



Walker, List Lepid. Ins. Brit. Mus. iv. p. 870 (1855); 



Moore, Lepid. Ceylon, ii. p. 99 (1883). 

 Psilura, Stephens, 111. Brit. Ent. Haust. ii. p. 57 (1828); 



Rambur, Cat. Le"pid. de 1'Andalusie, p. 276 (1866). 



This genus is very similar to the last, but the first joint of 

 the palpi is nearly half as long as the second, and the third is 

 acute. The sexes are nearly similar, and the male does not 

 fly by day. The female has a pointed abdomen, and a short 

 but conspicuous ovipositor. 



There are several Indian species of this genus closely re- 

 sembling L. monacha^ some of which have the wings spotted 



