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MOTHS AS OPERATIVES. 



E believe it was Reaumur, who, with the 

 lively fancy of his nation and character, first 

 thought of arranging certain caterpillars, as 

 well as some of the solitary workers among 

 wasps and bees, into the several crafts of 

 "Stonemasons," "Carpenters," "Tent-makers," "Muff- 

 makers," " Flask-makers," and " Miners." 



With respect to the solidity if not the ingenuity of his 

 fabric, let us begin with the * Stonemason." l He is the 

 caterpillar of a little moth with wings of gilded bronze, smaller, 

 but much resembling the clothes-moth, whose family name 

 (Tinea) he also bears, although in habits and locality, as well 

 as the material of his workmanship, he stands widely con- 

 trasted with the destructive of the wardrobe. Instead of 

 reposing, like the latter, in " Ladye's Bowre," encased in gar- 

 ment of wool, or silk, or down, and regaling on the same soft 

 and delicate substances of animal derivation, our hardy little 

 operative finds himself, on emerging from the egg, exposed 

 without protection on the surface of some lichen-covered wall. 

 Instructed, however, by that kind Power which in this very 

 lichen provides him with an ample store of provender, he 

 knows perfectly well how to meet the other exigencies of his 

 exposed position. Of what avail to him would be a silken or 

 a leafen tent, liable to be overset and borne away by the sum- 

 mer breeze? A stone-built tower suits his purpose better; 

 and such is the structure he proceeds forthwith to erect. By 

 help of "tooth and nail," he detaches small particles of the 

 stone or brick with which the wall supplies him, binds them 

 together with silk and a sort of natural cement, possessed in 

 common with his kind, and thus, after four-and-twenty hours 



1 Vignette. 



A A 



