286 



BRITISH MOTHS. 



are curved and porrected, the terminal joint 

 small and almost bare of scales ; the antennae 

 are slightly ciliated in the male, simple in the 

 female ; the fore wings are slightly arched on 

 the costa, especially towards the tip, which is 

 blunt ; the hind margin is waved ; their colour 

 is ochreous brown, with umber-brown mark- 

 ings ; the chief of these i a suffused blotch 

 between the discoidal spots, a move clearly de- 

 fined blotch at the base of the inner margin, 

 having its exterior border deeply notched, and 

 a hind marginal band, having its interior 

 border very irregular, and being intersected 

 throughout by a curved and indented pale 

 transverse line, exterior to which is a second 

 pale line, regularly zigzag ; the orbicular is 

 long and oblique ; the reniform of its usual 

 shape ; a double series of dark brown dots 

 crosses the wing exterior to the reniform : the 

 hind wings are dull dingy brown, with a 

 paler and iridescent costal margin, and a dark 

 crescentic discoidal *pot ; the head and thorax 

 are variegated with the two shades of orown 

 which prevail on the fore wings ; the body is 

 dorsally crested, of a dingy brown colour, with 

 the tips of the cre*b darker brown. 



The Rev. H. Harpur Crewe has thus 

 described the CATERPILLAR, in the Zoologist 

 for 1861 : "Back, dark brown : medio-dorsal 

 stripe, whitish, bordered on either .side of each 

 segment by two black spots : sub-dorsal stripes 

 slender, indistinct, whitish : the head and 

 second segment are dark brown, the head 

 rather the paler of the two, and traversed by 

 two black lines : the sides are pinkish drab, 

 marked on each side with a black spot : the 

 ventral surface is pale drab ; the back and 

 sides are thinly clothed with slender hairs. 

 This caterpillar hybernates in the autumn, 

 when nearly full fed, and begins to feed again 

 on grass, chick weed (Stellaria media), &c., in 

 February, and is full fed at the end of March, 

 or beginning of April : it then forms a neat 

 cocoon of earth or moss, and therein changes 

 to a dark red CHRYSALIS, the thorax and upper 

 part of the body being darker than the rest. 



The MOTH appears on the wing towards the 

 end of June, and has been taken in most of 

 our English counties. It has also been taken 



in Scotland by Mr. Lennon, and at Powers- 

 court, in Ireland, by Mr. Birchall. (The 

 scientific name is Xylophasia hepatica.) 



480. The Slender Clouded Brindle (Xylophasia 



scolopacina) . 



480. THE SLENDER CLOUDED BRINDLE. 

 The palpi are porrected and curved upwards, 

 the terminal joint very pointed ; the wings 

 are slightly arched on the costa, and scarcely 

 waved on the hind margin, the upper half of 

 which is nearly straight, while the lower 

 slopes rather abruptly to the anal angle ; their 

 colou 1 - 's dingy ochreous, but the markings are 

 generally very distinct. The reniform has a 

 distinct white circumscription, the orbicular 

 is indistinct; the space between them is dark 

 bistre-brown, in many specimens prolonged in 

 an indistinct manner to the inner margin, 

 which has also a very dark, distinct, and 

 somewhat linear blotch near its base ; beyond 

 the reniform is a sharply zigzag and elbowed 

 transverse line, the extremity of its lobes or 

 teeth being very dark, and often forming a 

 transverse series of dots ; the hind margin is 

 occupied by an umber-brown shade, intersected 

 throughout by a paler line, which terminates 

 at the tip of the wing in an ochreous blotch ; 

 the fringe is spotted ; the hind wings are 

 pale dingy brown, with a still paler fringe; the 

 head is ochreous brown ; the thorax ochreous 

 brown, with a posterior crest tipped with dark 

 brown ; the body is dingy brown, with a 

 medio-dorsal series of dark brown crests. 



Mr. Buckler has thus described the CATER- 

 PILLARS in the Entomologists' Monthly Maga- 

 zine for 1864 : " They feed on coarse 

 grasses, and a species of wood-rush (Luxul(i) ; 

 their bodies are uniformly cylindrical and 

 slender. The head, and plate on the second 

 segment, are of a translucent greenish tint, 

 and there is a black mark on each side of the 



