590 



INSECTA ORDER LEPIDOPTERA. 



Most of the silk-producing moths of any commercial value belong either to 

 the SaturniidcK or the Bombycidce. The common mulberry silk-worm moth, 

 Bombyx mori (Linn.), the type of the Bombyces, is too well known to need 

 description here. 



The Lasiocampidce are stout-bodied moths with strongly pectinated an- 

 tennae, and hairy caterpillars. They are generally of a brown or yellowish 



colour, and the wings are sometimes 

 dentated, but never tailed. It includes 

 the oak-eggar, drinker moth, lappet, 

 lackey moth, and other familiar British 

 species. The lackey moth, Clisiocampa 

 ncit.stria (Linn.), is remarkable for the 

 habit of the female in laying her eggs 

 in a ring round a slender twig. All the 

 larvae of this family are very hairy. 



Three families of Bombyces are remark- 

 able for their larvae feeding in the trunks 

 of trees, or on the roots of grasses ; as well as for the abnormal neuration of 

 the perfect insects. The goat-moth, Trypanns cossus (Linn.), belonging to 

 the family Zeuzeridce, is a broad-winged greyish-brown coarsely-scaled moth, 

 in which the discoidal cell of the wings is divided by additional nervures, 

 which are obsolete in most Lepidoptera. Its dark red, foul-smelling, naked 

 larva is very destructive to old willows, and takes three years to arrive at 

 maturity. 



The Castniidce are a South American group of stout-bodied moths, with 

 rather short and broad wings, measuring from two to six or seven inches in 



Fig. 75. LACKEY MOTH (Clisiocampa 

 neustriu). Nat. size. 



Fig. 76. Castnia syphax. 



expanse. The antennas are very thick, and rather tapering at the ends 

 They are brightly-coloured insects, and fly by day. They somewhat resemble 

 large Hesperiidce, and were classed as butterflies by all the older writers. 

 The cells of their wings are sub-divided, as in the Zeuzeridw, and hence we 

 notice them now, though their natural position is near the beginning of the 

 moths. The species figured, Castnia syphax (Fabr.), is black, with white 

 markings on the fore-wings and a red border to the hind-wings. 



