40 TIGER-MOTH CATERPILLARS. 



the tiny sticks of the Magpie, but clothed, d la Russe, in a 

 brown fur jacket. 



The moment we touch him, he curls up like a hedge-hog, 

 and falls from the plant upon the ground. From this practice 

 he is known to some people by the appellation of a " Devil's 

 ring," though why a creature harmless as a dove should have 

 acquired this misnomer it is hard to say. His proper, though 

 not, in his present state, a much more fitting appellation, is the 

 Caterpillar of the Tiger Moth ; he is now more like a little 

 bear; but bear or tiger, we have now at home a box or cage-full 

 of the like animals, born from the egg in the early part of last 

 October. Instead of attaining in a few weeks to the full 

 measure of their bulk, as is the case with the summer broods of 

 the same Caterpillar, these, like the little individuals just en- 

 countered, have been, since an early stage, quite stationary as 

 to growth, nearly the same as to motion, have kept on the same 

 coats, instead of often changing them, and it is only in mild 

 weather that they eat sparingly of the leaves of dandelion, 

 wherewith it is not easy to supply them. When the latter are 

 entirely nipped by frost or covered by snow, our little winterers 

 subsist as well without them, upon sleep. In this, their nice 

 and altered adaptation to a rigorous season and short supplies, 

 are not the growth and appetite even of these Caterpillars 

 worthy of notice ? 



With the arrival of April, and a plentiful supply of dock and 

 dandelion green meat, we shall find in our little " Tigers" a 

 proportionate increase of activity and appetite; their skins, as 

 they increase in size, will be frequently cast, and in May, each 

 having attained to the full measure of its growth, will display 

 to great advantage its jerkin of black velvet, ornamented with 

 rows of white studs, from each of which springs a long tuft of 

 gold-brown grey- tipped hairs, forming, en masse, an upper 

 coat of fur. Our Caterpillar will then speedily repay us for 

 the trouble of his keep, by showing how cleverly he can make 

 his cocoon, spinning it of his own silk, interweaving it with 



