SKIPPERS AND MOTHS. 589 



wings, with interlacing white markings, and red hindwings with large 

 bluish black spots. Its caterpillar, which is often called the woolly bear, 

 is common in gardens, and is covered with long reddish-brown hair, partly 

 tipped with white. It feeds on all sorts of low plants, and when disturbed, 

 rolls itself up into a ball, and drops among the herbage. Bred specimens 

 of the moth are paculiarly liable to vary, some of the specimens being quite 

 black ; but those reared in a state of nature are much less variable. 



The Liparidce are {mother family of stout-bodied Bombyces. Many of the 

 species are white, like the gold-tail and brown-tail moths, which are common 

 on hedges, and receive their names from the tuft of wool at the end of the 

 body, which the female uses to cover her eggs. They measure rather more 

 than an inch across the wings, and the larvae are gregarious, and are often 

 very destructive. 



Some of the families of moths classed as Bombyces have slender bodies 

 and long wings. The Lithosiidce are a group well represented in Europe. 

 They generally have oblong greyish fore-wings, with a yellowish streak on 

 the costa, and slate-coloured hind- wings : they measure about an inch and a 

 half in expanse, and their larvae feed on lichens. The cinnabar moth, 

 Hipocrita jacobcece (Linn.), is more brightly coloured, being black and red, 

 like the burnet moths, though the antennae and the pattern of the wings 

 are quite different. It is not rare in Britain. The South American family 

 Dioptidce includes larger moths, with more rounded wings, and more varied in 

 their colours. Some of them are partially transparent ; and many, except 

 in their simple or slightly pectinated antennae, resemble butterflies of the 

 sub-family Ithomiince. 



The Cyllopodidce are another South American family of rather small moths, 

 rarely measuring more than an inch and a half across the wings, which are 

 remarkable for their strongly contrasted black and yellow colour. 



The Psychidce are a family of small grey or, more frequently, smoky-black 

 moths, remarkable for their thick, hairy bodies, and strongly-pectinated 

 antennae. They rarely reach an inch in expanse, and 

 are found flying among long grass in the daytime. The 

 larvae construct a case of bits of vegetable matter, in 

 the same way as the larvae of the caddis-flies, and the 

 females are wingless, and in some instances, legless also, 

 in which latter cas3 they never quit the dwelling which p. 

 they have inhabited as larvae and pupae. The species furva. 'Nat. size, 

 figured, Chalia furva (Borkhausen), is rather scarce in 

 England. 



Among the largest moths are the Saturniidce, to which our emperor moth, 

 Saturnia pavonia-minor (Linn.), belongs. The emperor moth measures two 

 and a half to three inches across the wings, which are light brown, varied 

 with orange in the male, and of a soft grey in the female ; in the middle of 

 each wing is a large round eye-spot. The green, red-spotted larva feeds on 

 heath, and makes a flask-like cocoon. 



All the moths of this family have stout and often short bodies, pectinated 

 antennae, and ample wings, with a more or less developed eye-spot or trans- 

 parent mark in the middle of each. Some are green or brown, with long 

 tails on the hind-wings ; but the largest of all, the Indian Atlas Moth, which 

 sometimes measures a foot in expanse, has tawny brown fore-wings, with 

 festooned black and white lines, between which is a large talc-like spot on 

 each wing, of very irregular shape. 



