410 



BRITISH MOTHS. 



there is a slight prominence almost amounting 

 to a tooth, on the inner margin rather before 

 its middle, reminding one of the appendage 

 so generally observable in the genus Notodontn,; 

 the colour of the fore wings is rich umber- 

 brown, a good deal marbled and mottled with 

 browns of other shades ; the two discoidal 

 spots are conspicuous, and have an unusually 

 indented and irregular circumscription ; their 

 colour is testaceous-brown, but the reniform 

 has a long dark cloud extending parallel with 

 its interior border, and the orbicular has also 

 a dark central cloud ; a large blotch of tes- 

 taceous-brown is situated within the anal 

 angle of the wing ; there is a series of pale 

 dots on the hind margin, one at the point of 

 each tooth of the scalloped margin, and a 

 series of corresponding black dots, one in each 

 hollow of the scalloped margin ; within these, 

 but still parallel with the hind margin, is a 

 pale brown and interrupted zigzag line ; 

 below the discoidal spots, and parallel with 

 the inner margin, is a large and diffused, but 

 very dark blotch : the hind wings have an 

 irregular outline ; they are of a gray -brown 

 colour, slightly glossed and iridescent, paler 

 towards the base, and havinga vague crescentic 

 discoidal spot in the middle, and a series of 

 very slender crescentic markings on the ex- 

 treme margin : the head and thorax have the 

 same colour as the fore wings, the body the 

 same colour as the hind wings. 



I believe Freyer is the only entomologist 

 who has obtained the caterpillar of this 

 species ; the head is represented as of nearly 

 the same width as the second segment, rather 

 gibbous in the cheeks, and very slightly 

 notched on the crown; the body is uniformly 

 cylindrical, as far as and including the 

 twelfth segment, the thirteenth very much 

 narrower and smaller ; the anal claspers are 

 stretched out behind, and rather spreading, the 

 colour of the head and dorsal area is pale 

 testaceous-brown, each side of each segment 

 having an oblique darker line, each pair of 

 these lines forming the letter V, the point of 

 which is directed backwards ; an interrupted 

 medio- dorsal series of black spots passes 

 throu h each of these V's, and the first and 



second of these dorsal spots is accompanied by 

 a smaller white spot : the ventral area is pale 

 ochreous-green, and the legs and claspers par- 

 take of the same colour ; a very narrow but 

 distinct white stripe separates the dorsal from 

 the ventral area. 



The MOTH appears on the wing in August, 

 and two specimens are said to have been taken 

 in England one in Oxfordshire, the other in 

 Cambridgeshire and one in the county Wick- 

 low, in Ireland, by Mr. Bristow. (The scien- 

 tific name is Hadena safara.) 



643. The Northern Arches (Hadena assimilis). 



643. THE NORTHERN ARCHES. The palpi 

 are porrected, distant at the base, extremely 

 sharp-pointed, and rather incurved or approxi- 

 mating towards the tips ; the antennae are 

 perfectly simple in both sexes : the fore wings 

 are ample and densely clothed with scales ; 

 their colour is the richest umber-brown, almost 

 black, and glossed with purple ; the discoidal 

 spots are distinctly outlined in ochreous- 

 white, but there is a solution of continuity, 

 or almost so, on the inner side of each ; at the 

 base of the wing is a pale spot, and the disk 

 of the wing is traversed by two transverse 

 zigzag pale brown lines, one within the 

 orbicular, the other without the reniform ; 

 the hind marginal area between this second 

 transverse line and the hind margin itself is 

 traversed by eight pale parallel wing-rays, 

 and each joins a slender pale marginal line; 

 a minute white spot appearing at each junc- 

 tion : the hind wings are smoky towards the 

 hind margin, but paler at the base, and 

 having a distinct crescentic discoidal spot ; 

 the fringe is rather paler than the disk of the 

 wing, and there is a delicate pale line on the 

 hind margin itself, similar to that on.the fore 

 wings : the head and thorax are exactly of 



